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  11. <title>Dissident Voice</title>
  12. <atom:link href="https://dissidentvoice.org/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
  13. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org</link>
  14. <description>a radical newsletter in the struggle for peace and social justice</description>
  15. <lastBuildDate>Sun, 19 Oct 2025 01:35:49 +0000</lastBuildDate>
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  22. <item>
  23. <title>The CIA Wins Another Nobel Peace Prize</title>
  24. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-cia-wins-another-nobel-peace-prize/</link>
  26. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Michael K. Smith]]></dc:creator>
  27. <pubDate>Sun, 19 Oct 2025 01:35:49 +0000</pubDate>
  28. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  29. <category><![CDATA[Barack Obama]]></category>
  30. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
  31. <category><![CDATA[Peace]]></category>
  32. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  33. <category><![CDATA[Venezuela]]></category>
  34. <category><![CDATA[Alfred Nobel]]></category>
  35. <category><![CDATA[Bernardo Arévalo]]></category>
  36. <category><![CDATA[Bertha Felicie Sophie]]></category>
  37. <category><![CDATA[Global Sumud Flotilla]]></category>
  38. <category><![CDATA[Juan José Arévalo]]></category>
  39. <category><![CDATA[Woodrow Wilson]]></category>
  40. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162401</guid>
  41.  
  42. <description><![CDATA[<p>While millions waited in hopes that the Global Sumud Flotilla would win this year&#8217;s Nobel peace prize for its epic solidarity with Palestine, the Norwegian committee charged with granting the award gave it to Maria Corina Machado instead, veteran CIA coup plotter in Venezuela. As the late Gore Vidal aptly advised, &#8220;Never underestimate the Scandinavian [&#8230;]</p>
  43. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-cia-wins-another-nobel-peace-prize/">The CIA Wins Another Nobel Peace Prize</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  44. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>While millions waited in hopes that the Global Sumud Flotilla would win this year&#8217;s Nobel peace prize for its epic solidarity with Palestine, the Norwegian committee charged with granting the award gave it to Maria Corina Machado instead, veteran CIA coup plotter in Venezuela. As the late Gore Vidal aptly advised, &#8220;Never underestimate the Scandinavian sense of humor.&#8221;</p>
  45. <p>A day later in Gaza, the Israeli army destroyed the children&#8217;s hospital Al Rantisi with dynamite charges exponentially more powerful than those conceived by their inventor Alfred Nobel (1833-1896), creator of the prize that carries his name. With the victims&#8217; bodies barely cold in the rubble where the hospital previously stood, Machado praised the Holy State as a &#8220;genuine ally of liberty&#8221; while sending compliments to the &#8220;long-suffering Venezuelan people&#8221; as well as President Trump: &#8220;I accept this award in your honor, because you really deserve it.&#8221;</p>
  46. <p>Congratulations poured in, among them, from Barack Obama, who won the peace prize in 2009 on his way to authorizing seven wars in Muslim countries (Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, and Syria). Also from Guatemalan president Bernardo Arevalo, who called Machado a &#8220;world class Venezuelan,&#8221; an appraisal that would have shamed his father (Juan Jose Arevalo), the first democratically elected president of the Central American republic and author of <em>The Shark and the Sardines</em>, a strong anti-imperialist essay whose title alone captures the historic power dynamic between Washington and Latin America.</p>
  47. <p>Machado, a pseudo-Venezuelan &#8220;sardine&#8221; eager to sell-out her country to the &#8220;shark&#8221; in Washington, was received in the White House in 2005 by George W. Bush in recognition of the quality of her aspirations, and twenty years later she is still at it, imploring Trump to invade Venezuela in the name of liberty, democracy, and the struggle against narco-terrorism. Of course this has nothing to do with Venezuelan&#8217;s proven oil reserves of 303.8 billion barrels, the most of any country in the world.  Perish the thought.</p>
  48. <p>Dr. Nobel, an arms manufacturer who got the idea for awarding a peace prize from his secretary Bertha Felicie Sophie, who was a pacifist and feminist, as well as the author of <em>Lay Down Your Arms</em> (1889). In his will, Nobel stated that the profits from his considerable fortune were to reward &#8220;the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.&#8221;</p>
  49. <p>Since its creation (1901) the prize has been accompanied by pious Eurocentrism and conditioned by Great Power geopolitics that have more to do with tweaking the conditions of permanent war than they do with establishing peace. This was never more evident than in the case of Woodrow Wilson, who won the prize in 1919.</p>
  50. <p>Elected on a peace platform, Wilson immediately plunged the U.S. into the bloodiest war in world history (at the time) &#8212; World War I &#8212; transforming an expensive battlefield stalemate into a lopsided victory for the Allies, who promptly imposed a bitter and humiliating &#8220;peace&#8221; on starving Germany, which began to take growing note of the German-supremacist denunciations of an obscure Austrian corporal. Forgotten was Wilson&#8217;s Fourteen Points declaration he had boomed across the Atlantic on the pretext it contained the secret to human happiness and permanent world peace. Once his complete lack of strategic sense was revealed at Versailles, Europe&#8217;s veteran imperialists ignored his pious nostrum about establishing a &#8220;machinery of friendship&#8221; in favor of perpetuating European colonialism, leaving Wilson unable to convince even his own country to join his crowning glory &#8212; the League of Nations.  </p>
  51. <p>Other &#8220;great&#8221; Americans who won a Nobel peace prize include Nordic-supremacist Teddy Roosevelt, for whom war was a greater thrill than life itself, and whose popular book series, <em>The Winning of the West</em>, was worthy of Himmler. He estimated that &#8220;nine out of every ten&#8221; Indians were better dead than alive, deemed &#8220;coloreds&#8221; degenerate by nature, and looked on Latin peoples (&#8220;damned dagoes&#8221;) as little more than children. He applauded U.S. civilian massacres in the Philippines, which killed hundreds of thousands.</p>
  52. <p>However, the most genocidal U.S. winner of the peace prize would have to be the late Henry Kissinger, who befriended apartheid South Africa, ushered General Pinochet into power in Chile, gave the green light to Indonesia&#8217;s mass extermination of East Timor&#8217;s mountain people, and killed millions of Indochinese with saturation bombings. His comment about the Cambodian phase of the latter attacks, which paved the way for Pol Pot&#8217;s rise to power, make an ideal epitaph for the career of the clueless foreign policy expert: &#8220;I may have a lack of imagination, but I fail to see a moral issue involved.&#8221;</p>
  53. <p>With the Scandinavian sense of humor continuing to enrich our political folklore, there&#8217;s no reason for Donald Trump to lose hope.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-cia-wins-another-nobel-peace-prize/">The CIA Wins Another Nobel Peace Prize</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  57. </item>
  58. <item>
  59. <title>Trump, Tomahawks and Telephone Calls</title>
  60. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trump-tomahawks-and-telephone-calls/</link>
  62. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Gary Olson]]></dc:creator>
  63. <pubDate>Sat, 18 Oct 2025 21:46:40 +0000</pubDate>
  64. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  65. <category><![CDATA[Russia]]></category>
  66. <category><![CDATA[Ukraine]]></category>
  67. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  68. <category><![CDATA[Vladimir Putin]]></category>
  69. <category><![CDATA[Volodymyr Zelenskyy]]></category>
  70. <category><![CDATA[War]]></category>
  71. <category><![CDATA[Weaponry]]></category>
  72. <category><![CDATA[Alex Mercouris]]></category>
  73. <category><![CDATA[Garland Nixon]]></category>
  74. <category><![CDATA[Raytheon]]></category>
  75. <category><![CDATA[Tomahawks]]></category>
  76. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162395</guid>
  77.  
  78. <description><![CDATA[<p>Zelensky arrived in Washington on Friday, attired in his newly tailored suit, but he found no red carpet or even a high-level Trump official to greet him. Anticipating a cache of Tomahawks, he was apparently unaware of the telephone call between Trump and Putin and the meeting in Budapest in two weeks, to which he’s [&#8230;]</p>
  79. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trump-tomahawks-and-telephone-calls/">Trump, Tomahawks and Telephone Calls</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  80. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Zelensky arrived in Washington on Friday, attired in his newly tailored suit, but he found no red carpet or even a high-level Trump official to greet him. Anticipating a cache of Tomahawks, he was apparently unaware of the telephone call between Trump and Putin and the meeting in Budapest in two weeks, to which he’s been excluded. Zelensky did meet with officials from Raytheon, maker of the Tomahawk missiles.</p>
  81. <p>At a later press conference, Trump sidestepped questions about giving Tomahawks to Ukraine, except to say they were a “big deal, vicious and bad things can happen if they are used.” According to the Financial Times, the Pentagon’s supply is dangerously depleted, only 30-50 could be spared, and in any case, they would not change the outcome of the war.</p>
  82. <p>One can never be sure, but presumably, Trump has finally accepted that the US started this proxy war in 2014. But it was the mention of Tomahawks that prompted Putin to make it clear to Trump that he’s being lied to by Zelensky, Kellogg, his advisors, and the British about the war. To wit: The Russians are decidedly winning, and it’s a reality that Trump must accept.</p>
  83. <p>Alex Mercouris, another of my trusted sources, reports that because of their range and who would be operating them, Russia would consider the use of Tomahawks “a flagrant act of war.” As such, prospects for a negotiated end to the fighting and future trade with the United States would be dashed. Both these points were no doubt taken very seriously by Trump.</p>
  84. <p>Finally, I’ve long held the opinion that Trump wants out of the war but does not want, as Garland Nixon notes, an “out with an &#8216;L&#8217;.” Hence, after an intense to and fro among Putin’s inner circle, it was decided to offer one last, best off ramp for Trump. It will occur in Budapest in two weeks.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trump-tomahawks-and-telephone-calls/">Trump, Tomahawks and Telephone Calls</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  88. </item>
  89. <item>
  90. <title>Annie Dillard a la Rachel Carson a la David Quammen &#8212; Meet Journalist Caroline Tracey</title>
  91. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/annie-dillard-a-la-rachel-carson-a-la-david-quammen-meet-journalist-caroline-tracey/</link>
  93. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Paul Haeder]]></dc:creator>
  94. <pubDate>Sat, 18 Oct 2025 21:44:48 +0000</pubDate>
  95. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  96. <category><![CDATA[Central Ixachilan (America)]]></category>
  97. <category><![CDATA[Human Rights]]></category>
  98. <category><![CDATA[Immigration]]></category>
  99. <category><![CDATA[Internationalism]]></category>
  100. <category><![CDATA[Mexico]]></category>
  101. <category><![CDATA[Migration/Migrants]]></category>
  102. <category><![CDATA[Monroe Doctrine]]></category>
  103. <category><![CDATA[Refugees]]></category>
  104. <category><![CDATA[Turtle Island]]></category>
  105. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  106. <category><![CDATA[borderlands]]></category>
  107. <category><![CDATA[la frontera]]></category>
  108. <category><![CDATA[US-Mexico borderline]]></category>
  109. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162388</guid>
  110.  
  111. <description><![CDATA[<p>Caroline Tracey’s debut book, a blend of environmental reportage and memoir titled Salt Lakes: An Unnatural History, is forthcoming in March 2026 from W.W. Norton. Originally from Colorado, Caroline holds a doctorate in geography from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a recipient of the Waterston Prize for Desert Writing, the Ira A. Lipman [&#8230;]</p>
  112. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/annie-dillard-a-la-rachel-carson-a-la-david-quammen-meet-journalist-caroline-tracey/">Annie Dillard a la Rachel Carson a la David Quammen — Meet Journalist Caroline Tracey</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  113. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p data-pm-slice="1 1 []">Caroline Tracey’s debut book, a blend of environmental reportage and memoir titled <a href="&quot;https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1324089024/dissivoice-20"><em>Salt Lakes: An Unnatural History</em></a>, is forthcoming in March 2026 from W.W. Norton.</p>
  114. <p>Originally from Colorado, Caroline holds a doctorate in geography from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a recipient of the Waterston Prize for Desert Writing, the Ira A. Lipman Fellowship in Journalism and Human and Civil Rights, a Silvers Foundation Work-in-Progress grant, and an Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant, among other honors. In 2025, she received the inaugural On the Brinck | Places Prize for writing about the Southwest. She has also taught writing as a visiting professor at Deep Springs College.</p>
  115. <p>As a journalist and critic, Caroline’s work focuses on the environment, migration, and the arts in the US Southwest, Mexico, and their borderlands. Her reporting appears in the <em>New Yorker,</em> <em>n+1</em>, <em>New York Review of Books, High Country News</em>, and elsewhere, as well as in Spanish in Mexico’s <em>Nexos</em>. Her literary and art criticism appears in the <em>Nation</em>, the <em>New Republic, </em>and elsewhere, and has been commissioned by SFMOMA and the National Gallery of Art. Read more <a href="https://cetracey.com/#heading" target="_blank" rel="history noopener">here</a>.</p>
  116. <p>Caroline lives with her wife, Mexican architect <a href="http://marianagjp.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Mariana GJP</a>, between Tucson, Arizona and Mexico City.</p>
  117. <p style="text-align: center;">*****</p>
  118. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  119. <figure>
  120. <div class="image2-inset">
  121. <p><img decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!wOEc!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F47c90447-c303-48b5-a9a0-ea11524e3f2d_588x886.jpeg" alt="" width="300" height="452.7" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/47c90447-c303-48b5-a9a0-ea11524e3f2d_588x886.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:886,&quot;width&quot;:588,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:516,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  122. <div></div>
  123. </div>
  124. </figure>
  125. </div>
  126. <p>So, the show is upcoming, Dec. 10. She’s the kind of writer we need covering climate, <a href="https://www.alternet.org/2008/05/climate_destruction_will_produce_millions_of_envirogees">envirogees</a>, the nuances of the Borderlands, finding the unusual in the world, and normalizing what it means to be a protector of land, culture, ecology, and the web of life.</p>
  127. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  128. <figure>
  129. <div class="image2-inset">
  130. <p><img fetchpriority="high" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!0csm!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc1507278-2eec-4912-852d-f533082a0e52_750x1000.jpeg" alt="" width="392" height="523" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/c1507278-2eec-4912-852d-f533082a0e52_750x1000.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1000,&quot;width&quot;:750,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:602,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  131. <div></div>
  132. </div>
  133. </figure>
  134. </div>
  135. <p>These amazing salt lakes, which are basins for larger lakes draining and evaporating over thousands of years.</p>
  136. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  137. <figure>
  138. <div class="image2-inset">
  139. <p><img decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!O3hV!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa1fe5a77-1357-49ee-8ab7-88511554260b_360x181.png" alt="" width="360" height="181" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/a1fe5a77-1357-49ee-8ab7-88511554260b_360x181.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:181,&quot;width&quot;:360,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:45408,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa1fe5a77-1357-49ee-8ab7-88511554260b_360x181.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  140. <div></div>
  141. </div>
  142. </figure>
  143. </div>
  144. <p><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kOiQwUA-82yxjt-iJQgIlDPTB2Tak7ou/view?usp=sharing">LISTEN here to our talk</a>, prerecorded for my Finding Fringe: Voices from the Edge radio program.</p>
  145. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  146. <figure>
  147. <div class="image2-inset">
  148. <p><img decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="Mono Lake: How to save an endangered wonder of nature" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tq5O!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff38cf244-158f-4e99-b104-0e776c402077_1920x1080.jpeg" alt="Mono Lake: How to save an endangered wonder of nature" width="399" height="225" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/f38cf244-158f-4e99-b104-0e776c402077_1920x1080.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;Mono Lake: How to save an endangered wonder of nature&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  149. <div></div>
  150. </div>
  151. </figure>
  152. </div>
  153. <p>The good old days, into NOW:</p>
  154. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  155. <figure>
  156. <div class="image2-inset">
  157. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!A1nf!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe0a81ff5-0b5c-472f-9605-cbe660fd3643_1837x521.png" alt="" width="407" height="116" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/e0a81ff5-0b5c-472f-9605-cbe660fd3643_1837x521.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:413,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:1328074,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe0a81ff5-0b5c-472f-9605-cbe660fd3643_1837x521.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  158. <div></div>
  159. </div>
  160. </figure>
  161. </div>
  162. <p>These books are valuable, man, as they pile up in my office, and I hope to get Caroline&#8217;s new book; she&#8217;ll be at the Tucson Book Festival in March 2026, and alas, we hope to see her up here in the Pacific Northwest:</p>
  163. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  164. <figure>
  165. <div class="image2-inset">
  166. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction: Quammen, David: 8601416681139: Amazon.com: Books" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pBWb!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe3365be3-b204-474e-92a2-75006421d99b_662x1000.jpeg" alt="The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction: Quammen, David: 8601416681139: Amazon.com: Books" width="304" height="459" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/e3365be3-b204-474e-92a2-75006421d99b_662x1000.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1000,&quot;width&quot;:662,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:396,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction: Quammen, David: 8601416681139: Amazon.com: Books&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  167. <div></div>
  168. </div>
  169. </figure>
  170. </div>
  171. <p>A gem: Learn about this amazing Madagascar as that real Island Biogeography!</p>
  172. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  173. <figure>
  174. <div class="image2-inset">
  175. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="Island of Evolution: The One and Only Madagascar - Duke Lemur Center" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pyXZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F781fa785-3de5-4ac4-981e-83e501dc8577_1042x670.jpeg" alt="Island of Evolution: The One and Only Madagascar - Duke Lemur Center" width="443" height="285" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/781fa785-3de5-4ac4-981e-83e501dc8577_1042x670.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:670,&quot;width&quot;:1042,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;Island of Evolution: The One and Only Madagascar - Duke Lemur Center&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  176. <div></div>
  177. </div>
  178. </figure>
  179. </div>
  180. <p>I’ve had folk on about the Sky Islands and US-Mexico borderlands.</p>
  181. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  182. <figure>
  183. <div class="image2-inset">
  184. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vM8o!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F54c0a0ba-f1f6-474f-bbc8-962560542b64_796x785.png" alt="" width="398" height="393" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/54c0a0ba-f1f6-474f-bbc8-962560542b64_796x785.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:785,&quot;width&quot;:796,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:653853,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F54c0a0ba-f1f6-474f-bbc8-962560542b64_796x785.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  185. <div></div>
  186. </div>
  187. </figure>
  188. </div>
  189. <p>It will be well worth the journey to find her pieces outside or behind paywalls:</p>
  190. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  191. <figure>
  192. <div class="image2-inset">
  193. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IPdt!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe4d45155-0fad-43fd-a01d-84d2a733b255_817x845.png" alt="" width="431" height="446" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/e4d45155-0fad-43fd-a01d-84d2a733b255_817x845.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:845,&quot;width&quot;:817,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:341083,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe4d45155-0fad-43fd-a01d-84d2a733b255_817x845.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  194. <div></div>
  195. </div>
  196. </figure>
  197. </div>
  198. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  199. <figure>
  200. <div class="image2-inset">
  201. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ayTa!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3fc2f8f0-20a6-4f31-b3a9-fa9e1576a3cf_858x830.png" alt="" width="442" height="428" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3fc2f8f0-20a6-4f31-b3a9-fa9e1576a3cf_858x830.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:830,&quot;width&quot;:858,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:336767,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3fc2f8f0-20a6-4f31-b3a9-fa9e1576a3cf_858x830.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  202. <div></div>
  203. </div>
  204. </figure>
  205. </div>
  206. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  207. <figure>
  208. <div class="image2-inset">
  209. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5s83!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd318e69c-9043-4e1b-b4c8-b4cc0b87bb4b_809x839.png" alt="" width="447" height="464" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/d318e69c-9043-4e1b-b4c8-b4cc0b87bb4b_809x839.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:839,&quot;width&quot;:809,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:330794,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176464010?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd318e69c-9043-4e1b-b4c8-b4cc0b87bb4b_809x839.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  210. <div></div>
  211. </div>
  212. </figure>
  213. </div>
  214. <p>The state of journalism was discussed. The state of immigration predicated on economic conditions and environmental pressure were discussed.</p>
  215. <p>Ironically, many of the environmental crusaders in the Southwest are parachutists, coming to the area from other areas of US and Canada. White people, in a land of cultures, indigenes, and here we are, the irony of so many good-intentioned people moving in and putting pressure on ecosystems in and around Tucson, and farther out, where that lovely lifestyle of the Sonoran Desert is their nirvana.</p>
  216. <p>I brought up, briefly, <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/author/andrevltchek/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener">Andre Vltchek</a>&#8216;s</p>
  217. <p><a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/09/stop-millions-of-western-immigrants/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer nofollow noopener"><strong>Stop Millions of Western Immigrants!</strong></a></p>
  218. <blockquote><p>Tens of millions of European and North American immigrants, legal and illegal, have been flooding both the cities and countryside in Asia, Latin America, and even Africa.</p>
  219. <p>Tens of millions of European and North American immigrants, legal and illegal, have been flooding both the cities and countryside in Asia, Latin America, and even Africa.</p>
  220. <p>Western migrants are charging like bulls and the ground is shaking under their feet; they are fleeing Europe and North America in hordes. Deep down they cannot stand their own lifestyle, their own societies, but you would hardly hear them pronounce it. They are too proud and too arrogant! But, after recognizing innumerable areas of the world as suitable for their personal needs – as safe, attractive and cheap – they simply pack and go!</p>
  221. <p>We are told that some few hundred thousand African and Asian exiles are now causing a great “refugee crises” all over Europe! Governments and media are spreading panic, borders are being re-erected and armed forces are interrupting the free movement of people. But the number of foreigners illegally entering Europe is incomparably smaller than the number of Western migrants that are inundating, often illegally, virtually all corners of the world.</p>
  222. <p>No “secret paradise” can be hidden any longer and no country can maintain its reasonable price structure. Potential European, North American and Australian immigrants are determined to enrich themselves by any means, at the expense of local populations. They are constantly searching for bargains: monitoring prices everywhere, ready to move at the spur of the moment, as long as the place offers some great bargains, has lax immigration laws, and a weak legal framework.</p>
  223. <p>Everything pure and untapped gets corrupted. With lightning speed, Western immigrants are snatching reasonably priced real estate and land. Then, they impose their lifestyle on all those “newly conquered territories”. As a result, entire cultures are collapsing or changing beyond recognition.</p>
  224. <p>Overall, Western immigrants are arrogant and stubborn; they feel no pity for the countries they are inundating. What surrounds them is only some colorful background to their precious lives. They are unable and unwilling to “adopt” local customs, because they are used to the fact that theirs is the “leading culture” – the culture that controls the world.</p>
  225. <p>They come, they demand, and they take whatever they can – often by force. If unchecked, they take everything. After, when there is almost nothing left to loot, they simply move on. After them, “no grass can grow”; everything is burned, ruined and corrupted. Like Bali, Phuket, Southern Sri Lanka, great parts of the Caribbean, Mexico and East African coast, just to name a few places.</p></blockquote>
  226. <p>Caroline is bright, quick-witted, and a real journalist’s journalist. Listen to the interview.</p>
  227. <p><a href="https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2023/07/this-is-how-northern-mexico-became-a-climate-migration-destination/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">This Is How Northern Mexico Became a Climate Migration Destination</a></p>
  228. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!uNdU!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fac40a5fe-f689-4877-9502-9b00ccc34a3e_400x400.jpeg" width="350" height="350" /></p>
  229. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ln78!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F015f4d6c-be0f-430f-ae75-aaaf7cc8a0ed_400x400.png" width="349" height="349" /></p>
  230. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!JVAF!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd7ea5ae3-b595-4dd3-9c9c-ca72a376b448_400x400.jpeg" width="351" height="351" /></p>
  231. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!B0nu!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F577c2309-00db-4d5e-aa40-0a740935d909_400x400.jpeg" width="334" height="334" /></p>
  232. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IOc3!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F212eecbb-e850-4ff7-a373-018fe83e4266_400x400.png" width="357" height="357" /></p>
  233. <p>Great writers before Caroline&#8217;s emergence:</p>
  234. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!jDzW!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c7982f5-20b5-4cfd-a49c-102105aa364a_315x475.jpeg" alt="Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters by Annie Dillard | Goodreads" width="285" height="430" /></p>
  235. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!g0XZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa79fea18-7f9c-4b81-bfb2-07b2b60a45b4_524x763.png" width="457" height="665" /></p>
  236. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!4ile!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc012ca0f-1fc1-4bf0-9545-2d9a62df2468_1920x1080.jpeg" alt="The legacy of &quot;Silent Spring&quot;" width="410" height="231" /></p>
  237. <p style="text-align: center;">[The Rio Grande flows in a rugged and scenic part of northern New Mexico in May 2011. BobWick]<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/779d8f5/2147483647/strip/true/crop/1500x1000+0+0/resize/880x587!/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Flegacy%2Fs3fs-public%2Frio-grande-blm-2011.jpg" alt="Rio Grande river" width="437" height="292" /></p>
  238. <p>Here, behind a paywall: &#8220;<a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/against-the-wall-border-patrol/">The Indefensible Job of Policing the Border . . .</a>&#8221;<br />
  239. <em>Against the Wall,</em> a former border officer’s memoir, argues that when it comes to protecting the border, cruelty is the point.</p>
  240. <blockquote>
  241. <p class="has-drop-cap">In the summer of 2021, I sat in on a presentation given by two members of the US Border Patrol’s Missing Migrants Program—a small initiative of the agency to devote resources to identifying the recovered remains of deceased migrants—to a group of college students on a trip to learn more about the US-Mexico border.</p>
  242. </blockquote>
  243. <div id="books-block-block_ab6b73fff8f4c66ca9e21aa0c0b993e4" class="books-block float-l-w-3">
  244. <div class="books-block__books">
  245. <blockquote>
  246. <div class="books-block__book">The presentation took place at the South Texas Human Rights Center in Falfurrias, a town of 5,000 long considered the epicenter of migrant death in the state, despite being 75 miles north of the border. The reason for the deaths is that the town is the site of a major Border Patrol checkpoint that migrants must circumvent on foot; many lose their lives in the hot, immense shrubland of the local ranches.</div>
  247. </blockquote>
  248. </div>
  249. <div></div>
  250. </div>
  251. <div><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter" src="https://www.thenation.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/GettyImages-166402891.jpg" width="470" height="296" /></div>
  252. <div id="books-block-block_ab6b73fff8f4c66ca9e21aa0c0b993e4" class="books-block float-l-w-3"></div>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/annie-dillard-a-la-rachel-carson-a-la-david-quammen-meet-journalist-caroline-tracey/">Annie Dillard a la Rachel Carson a la David Quammen — Meet Journalist Caroline Tracey</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  256. </item>
  257. <item>
  258. <title>Trump’s Diplomatic Initiative: A New Dawn or Just Another Dusk?</title>
  259. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trumps-dipomatic-initiative-a-new-dawn-or-just-another-dusk/</link>
  261. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Richard Falk]]></dc:creator>
  262. <pubDate>Sat, 18 Oct 2025 21:16:47 +0000</pubDate>
  263. <category><![CDATA[Apartheid]]></category>
  264. <category><![CDATA[Benjamin Netanyahu]]></category>
  265. <category><![CDATA[Crimes against Humanity]]></category>
  266. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  267. <category><![CDATA[East Jerusalem]]></category>
  268. <category><![CDATA[Gaza]]></category>
  269. <category><![CDATA[Genocide]]></category>
  270. <category><![CDATA[Hamas]]></category>
  271. <category><![CDATA[Humanitarianism]]></category>
  272. <category><![CDATA[International Law]]></category>
  273. <category><![CDATA[Israel]]></category>
  274. <category><![CDATA[Israeli Defense Force (IDF)]]></category>
  275. <category><![CDATA[Middle East]]></category>
  276. <category><![CDATA[Occupation]]></category>
  277. <category><![CDATA[Palestine]]></category>
  278. <category><![CDATA[Peace]]></category>
  279. <category><![CDATA[Resistance]]></category>
  280. <category><![CDATA[Right of Return]]></category>
  281. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  282. <category><![CDATA[War]]></category>
  283. <category><![CDATA[West Bank]]></category>
  284. <category><![CDATA[Zionism]]></category>
  285. <category><![CDATA[Greater Israel]]></category>
  286. <category><![CDATA[Nobel Peace Prize]]></category>
  287. <category><![CDATA[nuclear-free zone]]></category>
  288. <category><![CDATA[Palestinian rights]]></category>
  289. <category><![CDATA[Peace & Reconciliation Commission]]></category>
  290. <category><![CDATA[Sharm el-Sheik Summit]]></category>
  291. <category><![CDATA[Trump 20 Point Plan]]></category>
  292. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162387</guid>
  293.  
  294. <description><![CDATA[<p>Prefatory Note: The post below is based on modified responses to questions addressed to me by Rodrigo Craveiro, a Brazilian journalist. The focus is on what to expect in the weeks ahead to follow from the Trump diplomatic offensive to bring an Israeli-crafted peace to fruition in Gaza, and broader stability to the entire Middle East. [&#8230;]</p>
  295. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trumps-dipomatic-initiative-a-new-dawn-or-just-another-dusk/">Trump’s Diplomatic Initiative: A New Dawn or Just Another Dusk?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  296. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><strong>Prefatory Note: </strong>The post below is based on modified responses to questions addressed to me by Rodrigo Craveiro, a Brazilian journalist. The focus is on what to expect in the weeks ahead to follow from the Trump diplomatic offensive to bring an Israeli-crafted peace to fruition in Gaza, and broader stability to the entire Middle East.</p>
  297. <ol class="wp-block-list">
  298. <li><strong>There is a sense of joy but also of fury due to the fact that not all the bodies returned to Israel. How do you see this?</strong></li>
  299. </ol>
  300. <p>Given the overall experience of the past two years, the attention accorded to the hostages by the Western media is misleadingly disproportionate, and as usual, Israel-biased. And now the pain of those Israelis who seek the agreed return of the bodies of non-surviving hostages is an extension of this distortion that shifts global concerns away from the terrible carnage and ccontinuing suffering in Gaza, and the totally ravaged homeland of the Palestinians that is being subject to day after arrangements made by its tormentors without Palestinian participation, much less authentic representation selected by the Palestinian people. Legitimate Palestinian leadership does not presently exist, even if there existed a commitment to identify and endow such individuals with appropriate roles. For sustainable progress toward a just future peace, the Palestinians must participate and be represented by their own choosing. Such a reality can only be decided by the Palestinians themselves, most obviously, in an internationally monitored competitive election among rival claimants to Palestinian leadership throughout Occupied Palestine.</p>
  301. <p>Hamas evidently agreed to return the bodies of dead hostages in their possession. Still, given the difficulty of locating the bodies and collecting the remains, unless there is a genuine repudiation by Hamas of this underlying duty associated with the ceasefire, their goodwill deserves the benefit of the doubt. The disappointment of the families in Israel that suffered from this human loss is understandable, but it should be interpreted in ways that are subordinate to more relevant issues, such as ceasefire violations. It was reported two days after the ceasefire went into effect that Israel killed by gunfire and missiles 7 Palestinians seeking to visit their destroyed home in Gaza City, a disturbing incident which seemed to receive scant, if any, coverage in international media or mainstream international commentary, and yet could be seen as evidence of the fragility of the ceasefire arrangements or an indication that Israel is ready to risk or is even seeking the collapse of the ceasefire by testing its limits. A carefree attitude toward the renewal of the violent encounter that rests on implied, or even secret, assurances of unwavering US support.</p>
  302. <ul class="wp-block-list">
  303. <li><strong>Trump addressed the Israeli Knesset, where he said his peace plan marks the “historic dawn of a new Middle East.” Do you believe this is something real, or is he exaggerating?</strong></li>
  304. </ul>
  305. <p>My best guess is that historians looking back at those words will conclude that Trump had confused dawn with dusk. There is no prospect of a brightening of the dark skies casting a shadow on the countries of the Middle East until Palestinian rights are respected, and that includes honoring the international right of return of the seven million Palestinian refugees. There must be a campaign to obtain proper accountability for the Gaza Genocide. Until the costs of Gaza reconstruction are borne by the perpetrators of the devastation, accompanied by some process of reconciliation that does not whitewash the crimes of Israel and its enablers, it will be impossible to create a peaceful future for the region. At the very least, the vast devastation caused by the genocide must be physically overcome by a process of reconstruction funded by adequate reparations. The scope of reconstruction must include health, heritage, and religious sites; educational and cultural institutions; residential neighborhoods; UNRWA facilities; and much more. The most painful losses of loved ones and body parts can never be compensated for by material means and are an enduring negative legacy of the Gaza Genocide. Even recognizing pragmatic constraints on peacemaking given political conditions a ‘peace’ crafted to please the perpetrator of genocide and its most complicit supporter, is highly unlikely to proceed very far. The Trump 20 Point Plan is not a break with the past, but an effort to induce forgetfulness necessary to attain credibility in proposing post-conflict arrangements. To grasp the ironies of this Trump Plan, we should imagine our reactions if the Nazi survivors of World War II had been put in charge of designing the future of the international order, or even of just post-war Germany. It would not have seemed like a step toward a peaceful future, regardless of the language used to obscure the perverse underlying reality.</p>
  306. <p><strong>3- Trump and the three mediating governments signed the peace plan for Gaza at the Sharm el-Sheik Summit. Given this development, what can we expect to happen in the future?</strong></p>
  307. <p>It is almost universally believed that the ceasefire should remain operative even if violations of the underlying plan occur or its further implementation stalls. Beyond this, it is a matter of how much leverage the US exerts to advance the governance proposals in Part II of Trump&#8217;s Plan. Whether Hamas and Palestinian resistance forces are subject to being coerced by further threats of Israeli renewal of its genocidal assault is unclear. It is also uncertain if the US would go along with an Israeli unilateral departure from the Trump Plan. Israel is quite capable of fabricating claims that Hamas is violating the ceasefire and related obligations, leaving it no choice but to resume its military operations. It would appear at this time that Trump would allow Israel to exercise such an option. At the same time, Trump is so mercurial and narcissistic that it is possible he would regard Israel’s action as undermining his claims as peacemaker and repudiate the Israeli resumption of large-scale violence in Gaza. In an odd way, Israel and Trump may turn out to have different goals. Israel has not given up its quest for ‘Greater Israel,’ which means absorbing not only East Jerusalem, but Gaza and the West Bank within its sovereign territory. Trump may still strangely believe he can obtain the Nobel Peace Prize if his Plan is operationalized in Gaza and the two conflicting parties accept the arrangements.</p>
  308. <p>Overall, it is clear that peace and stability will not be the future of the Middle East until Israel respects Palestinian rights, drastically redefines or repudiates Zionism and apartheid in a manner consistent with international law, and agrees to the establishment of a Peace &amp; Reconciliation Commission to acknowledge Israel’s past criminal violations of Palestinian rights and to announce a new dedication to the creation of an independent commission that assists the Palestinian/Israeli leadership to build future relations between Jews and Arabs on the basis of equality, dignity, and rights as the foundation for sustainable patterns of peaceful coexistence. For a truly new and stable Middle East, Israel must agree to the establishment of a nuclear-free zone, including itself and Iran.</p>
  309. <p><strong>4- What are the Risks of Clashes between Hamas and Gaza Clans and Factions?</strong></p>
  310. <p>These issues are murky, with contending interpretations and explanations of their recent prominence amid this most ambitious effort to develop the current ceasefire pause into a framework for long-term conflict resolution by implementing, perhaps with modifications, the advanced phases of the Trump 20 Point Plan. In this context, Israel seems to welcome these tensions within Gaza, by various means, including subsidies, to allow them an option to exit from this series of developments that might challenge their annexation plans in the West Bank as well as Gaza. It is possible that the Netanyahu government agreed to the ceasefire only to secure the return of the hostages, and never assented to any wider interference with its militarist approach, and may have had assurances of Trump’s support, no matter what.  If this plays out, Israel would actually welcome the collapse of the conflict-resolution part of the framework in a manner that would find tacit acceptance, if not outright approval, in Washington. Such a manipulation of reality requires pinning the blame on Hamas, which is currently taking the form of criticizing Hamas for seeking to destroy those armed groups in Gaza that collaborated with the Israeli military operations.</p>
  311. <p>Such a line of interpretation is reinforced by Israeli unreasonably shrill complaints about Hamas&#8217; failure to return all of the bodies of the dead hostages. On its part, Hamas claims it has returned all the remains it could discover with its existing equipment, given that some dead hostages remain trapped far beneath the rubble. This seems a reasonable explanation, as Hamas has little incentive to retain the remains of dead Israeli hostages or to take steps that provide an excuse for Israel to resume bombardment and other forms of violence in Gaza.</p>
  312. <p>Such a line of interpretation is also consistent with Israel’s pattern of lethal violence killing Palestinians in several instances that have the clear appearance of being deliberate violations of the ceasefire agreement. Additionally, Israeli interference with the delivery of humanitarian aid by reducing the entry of relief goods by 50% is another expression of Israel’s unwillingness to allow even a conflict-resolving process weighted in its favor to go forward. These are serious provocations by Israel, causing sharp criticism from some governments that had previously endorsed the Trump approach, but not yet even a whimper of disapproval from the US.</p>
  313. <p>The gathering evidence suggests that Israel is accumulating grounds for repudiating the ‘peace’ process and resuming its military operations, accompanied by a renewed clampdown on the further delivery of humanitarian aid, despite widespread hunger, disease, and trauma among the civilian population of Gaza. The next week or so shall determine whether this pessimistic assessment dooms the ceasefire and the prospects for conflict-resolution through diplomacy rather than further recourse to genocide. Israel, since the return of the living hostages in Gaza, holds all the cards, and Hamas has none except for its incredible capacity for resilience.</p>
  314. <p>As yet, there are no signs pointing to a new dawn.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/trumps-dipomatic-initiative-a-new-dawn-or-just-another-dusk/">Trump’s Diplomatic Initiative: A New Dawn or Just Another Dusk?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  318. </item>
  319. <item>
  320. <title>“No Kings” — Another Chapter in the Quest for an Empire without an Emperor</title>
  321. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/no-kings-another-chapter-in-the-quest-for-an-empire-without-an-emperor/</link>
  323. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Sam Husseini]]></dc:creator>
  324. <pubDate>Fri, 17 Oct 2025 20:32:36 +0000</pubDate>
  325. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  326. <category><![CDATA[Democrats]]></category>
  327. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  328. <category><![CDATA[Gaza]]></category>
  329. <category><![CDATA[Genocide]]></category>
  330. <category><![CDATA[Israel]]></category>
  331. <category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
  332. <category><![CDATA[Syria]]></category>
  333. <category><![CDATA[Ukraine]]></category>
  334. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  335. <category><![CDATA[Yemen]]></category>
  336. <category><![CDATA[Fareed Zakaria]]></category>
  337. <category><![CDATA[John Bolton]]></category>
  338. <category><![CDATA[US politics]]></category>
  339. <category><![CDATA[Van Jones]]></category>
  340. <category><![CDATA[“No Kings” protests]]></category>
  341. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162383</guid>
  342.  
  343. <description><![CDATA[<p>&#160; There are many hyped “No Kings” protests this weekend. They seem fairly clearly a creation of the DNC or some appendage of it. They reflect a wretched sentiment I criticized back in 2017 — how many were “In Search of an Empire without an Emperor”: When Trump uses military violence in Yemen or Syria, [&#8230;]</p>
  344. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/no-kings-another-chapter-in-the-quest-for-an-empire-without-an-emperor/">“No Kings” — Another Chapter in the Quest for an Empire without an Emperor</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  345. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container">
  346. <figure>
  347. <div class="image2-inset">
  348. <picture><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NOOZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp" sizes="auto, 100vw" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NOOZ!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NOOZ!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NOOZ!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!NOOZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp 1456w" alt="" width="505" height="265" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/98b50e47-8d96-49ba-8a2b-7656776d40d1_1200x630.webp&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:630,&quot;width&quot;:1200,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:52634,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/webp&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://husseini.substack.com/i/176439975?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F756a0121-1617-4632-ac18-f90e5db18858_1200x630.webp&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></picture>
  349. <p>&nbsp;</p>
  350. <div class="image-link-expand">
  351. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  352. <p>There are many hyped “No Kings” protests this weekend. They seem fairly clearly a creation of the DNC or some appendage of it.</p>
  353. <p>They reflect a wretched sentiment I criticized back in 2017 — how many were “<a href="https://husseini.posthaven.com/in-search-of-an-empire-without-an-emperor-dynamics-behind-the-comey-firing" rel="">In Search of an Empire without an Emperor</a>”:</p>
  354. <blockquote><p>When Trump uses military violence in Yemen or Syria, he is lauded by presumed liberals like Van Jones and Fareed Zakaria as presidential.… This leads to a political culture based on loving or hating various political figures.</p></blockquote>
  355. <p>It is a case of interesting timing that these protests are taking place after the so-called “ceasefire” finally happened in Gaza.</p>
  356. <p>The establishment very much wants to stuff people back into their partisan boxes and to eviscerate any notion that decent people on the left and right might build on their revulsion of imperial Israel’s genocide.</p>
  357. <p>Moreover, I’d not be shocked if “liberals” at these “protests” had signs for more weapons to Ukraine and in defense of John Bolton.</p>
  358. <p>So, if you do go to these protests, I’d recommend you have a sign denouncing Empire, the duopoly, and/or wear a keffiyeh.</p>
  359. <p>Protest the protest.</p>
  360. <p>What is needed is a massive realignment of US politics. We need people breaking out of their partisan boxes, not calcifying in them. This is part of my <a href="https://votepact.org/" rel="">VotePact.org</a> project, which can upend and make right much of US politics.</p>
  361. </div>
  362. </div>
  363. </div>
  364. </figure>
  365. </div>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/no-kings-another-chapter-in-the-quest-for-an-empire-without-an-emperor/">“No Kings” — Another Chapter in the Quest for an Empire without an Emperor</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  369. </item>
  370. <item>
  371. <title>The West’s Dehumanization Of Arabs Is Completely Unforgivable</title>
  372. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable/</link>
  374. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Caitlin Johnstone]]></dc:creator>
  375. <pubDate>Fri, 17 Oct 2025 20:04:47 +0000</pubDate>
  376. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  377. <category><![CDATA[Gaza]]></category>
  378. <category><![CDATA[Genocide]]></category>
  379. <category><![CDATA[Hamas]]></category>
  380. <category><![CDATA[Islam]]></category>
  381. <category><![CDATA[Israel]]></category>
  382. <category><![CDATA[Israeli Defense Force (IDF)]]></category>
  383. <category><![CDATA[Lebanon]]></category>
  384. <category><![CDATA[Palestine]]></category>
  385. <category><![CDATA[Racism]]></category>
  386. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  387. <category><![CDATA[Zionism]]></category>
  388. <category><![CDATA[Arabs]]></category>
  389. <category><![CDATA[Charlie Kirk]]></category>
  390. <category><![CDATA[Lina Mounzer]]></category>
  391. <category><![CDATA[US Empire]]></category>
  392. <category><![CDATA[Western civilization]]></category>
  393. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162376</guid>
  394.  
  395. <description><![CDATA[<p>In October 2024, a Lebanese writer named Lina Mounzer wrote, “ask any Arab what the most painful realization of the last year has been and it is this: that we have discovered the extent of our dehumanization to such a degree that it’s impossible to function in the world in the same way.” I’ve thought [&#8230;]</p>
  396. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable/">The West’s Dehumanization Of Arabs Is Completely Unforgivable</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  397. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<figure class="alignwide wp-block-post-featured-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image" src="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=1024" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" srcset="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=1024 1024w, https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=150 150w, https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=300 300w, https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=768 768w, https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png 1080w" alt="" width="505" height="27" data-attachment-id="5928" data-permalink="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2025/10/17/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable/" data-orig-file="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png" data-orig-size="1080,565" data-comments-opened="0" data-image-meta="{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}" data-image-title="The West’s Dehumanization Of Arabs Is Completely Unforgivable" data-image-description="" data-image-caption="" data-medium-file="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable.png?w=1024" /></figure>
  398. <div class="wp-block-group is-content-justification-center is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-core-group-is-layout-23441af8 wp-block-group-is-layout-flex"></div>
  399. <p>In October 2024, a Lebanese writer named Lina Mounzer <a href="https://themarkaz.org/a-year-of-war-without-end/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">wrote</a>, “ask any Arab what the most painful realization of the last year has been and it is this: that we have discovered the extent of our dehumanization to such a degree that it’s impossible to function in the world in the same way.”</p>
  400. <p>I’ve thought about that line a lot over the last year.</p>
  401. <p>I thought about it as Israel <a href="https://news.antiwar.com/2025/10/16/heavy-israeli-airstrikes-reported-in-southern-and-eastern-lebanon/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">hammered Lebanon</a> with <a href="https://x.com/DropSiteNews/status/1978903968257302563" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">at least 20 airstrikes</a> during a supposed “ceasefire”.</p>
  402. <p>I thought about it during the Gaza ceasefire negotiations when the Western political/media class <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sB-AIcI-6U" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">kept calling</a> the Israelis held by Hamas “hostages” while calling the innocent Palestinians held captive by Israel “prisoners”.</p>
  403. <p>I think about it as the IDF continues to <a href="https://news.antiwar.com/2025/10/16/israeli-forces-kill-at-least-three-more-palestinians-in-gaza-despite-ceasefire/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">murder Palestinian civilians</a> every day during the Gaza “ceasefire” when they are deemed to be traveling into forbidden areas, because Palestinians are so dehumanized that Israel sees bullets as a perfectly legitimate means of directing civilian foot traffic.</p>
  404. <p>I think about it as these daily ceasefire violations and acts of military slaughter barely make a blip in the western news media, while any time anything happens that makes western Jews feel anxious or upset, it dominates headlines for days.</p>
  405. <p>I thought about it while the western political/media class solemnly commemorated the second anniversary of the October 7 attack, even as the daily death toll from the Gaza holocaust ticked along with its victims unnamed and unacknowledged by those same institutions.</p>
  406. <p>I thought about it when all of Western politics and media stopped dead in its tracks and stood transfixed for days on the assassination of Charlie Kirk while ignoring the genocide <a href="https://x.com/charliekirk11/status/1711744124184146283" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">he had spent</a> the last <a href="https://x.com/charliekirk11/status/1949908699411288130" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">two years of his life</a> actively <a href="https://x.com/ZabAkbar/status/1967876221301297526" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">manufacturing consent for</a>.</p>
  407. <p>Day after day after day, we see glaring, inexcusable discrepancies between the amount of attention that is given to the violent death of an Arab and the attention that is given to the violent death of an Israeli, a Western Jew, or any Westerner.</p>
  408. <p>These last two years have been a time of unprecedented unmasking in all sorts of ways, but I think that’s the one that’s going to stick with me the most. The way Western civilization came right out into the cold, harsh light to admit, day after day after day, that they don’t truly view Arabs as human beings.</p>
  409. <p>Ours is a profoundly sick society.</p>
  410. <p>One of the main arguments you’ll hear from rightists about why the West needs to support Israel is that Israel is helping to defend the West from the savage Muslim hordes — a sentiment that Israeli pundits and politicians have been <a href="https://x.com/caitoz/status/1963393443545366668" target="_blank" rel="noopener">all too happy to feed into</a> of late. It’s revealing because it’s just coming right out and saying that slaughtering Muslims is a virtue in and of itself, so anyone who kills Muslims is an ally of the West.</p>
  411. <p>But whenever I come across this argument, all I can think is, why would anyone want to defend the West if this is what it has become?</p>
  412. <p>Even if we pretend that these delusions that Arabs and Islam pose some kind of threat to Western civilization are valid, why would it even matter? This civilization does not deserve to be saved. Not if we’re going to be living like this.</p>
  413. <p>If we’ve become so detached from our own humanity that we can’t even see innocent children as fully human just because they live somewhere else and have a different religion, then we are the monsters. We are the villains. We are everything the craziest Zionist pretends the Arabs are.</p>
  414. <p>These last two years have shown us that Western civilization doesn’t need protection; it needs redemption. It needs to save its soul.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-wests-dehumanization-of-arabs-is-completely-unforgivable/">The West’s Dehumanization Of Arabs Is Completely Unforgivable</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  418. </item>
  419. <item>
  420. <title>It was never a Gaza &#8216;war&#8217;. The &#8216;ceasefire&#8217; is a lie cut from the same cloth</title>
  421. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/it-was-never-a-gaza-war-the-ceasefire-is-a-lie-cut-from-the-same-cloth/</link>
  423. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Jonathan Cook]]></dc:creator>
  424. <pubDate>Fri, 17 Oct 2025 19:23:00 +0000</pubDate>
  425. <category><![CDATA[Apartheid]]></category>
  426. <category><![CDATA[Benjamin Netanyahu]]></category>
  427. <category><![CDATA[B’Tselem]]></category>
  428. <category><![CDATA[Crimes against Humanity]]></category>
  429. <category><![CDATA[Disinformation]]></category>
  430. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  431. <category><![CDATA[Ethnic Cleansing]]></category>
  432. <category><![CDATA[Gaza]]></category>
  433. <category><![CDATA[Geneva Convention]]></category>
  434. <category><![CDATA[Genocide]]></category>
  435. <category><![CDATA[Hamas]]></category>
  436. <category><![CDATA[Humanitarianism]]></category>
  437. <category><![CDATA[Hunger/Famine]]></category>
  438. <category><![CDATA[Incarceration]]></category>
  439. <category><![CDATA[International Court of Justice]]></category>
  440. <category><![CDATA[Israel]]></category>
  441. <category><![CDATA[Israeli Defense Force (IDF)]]></category>
  442. <category><![CDATA[Land Theft]]></category>
  443. <category><![CDATA[Mahmoud Abbas]]></category>
  444. <category><![CDATA[Massacres]]></category>
  445. <category><![CDATA[Occupation]]></category>
  446. <category><![CDATA[Palestine]]></category>
  447. <category><![CDATA[Palestinian Authority]]></category>
  448. <category><![CDATA[Peace]]></category>
  449. <category><![CDATA[Political Prisoners]]></category>
  450. <category><![CDATA[Propaganda]]></category>
  451. <category><![CDATA[Resistance]]></category>
  452. <category><![CDATA[Tony Blair]]></category>
  453. <category><![CDATA[Torture]]></category>
  454. <category><![CDATA[United Nations]]></category>
  455. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  456. <category><![CDATA[War]]></category>
  457. <category><![CDATA[West Bank]]></category>
  458. <category><![CDATA[collective punishment]]></category>
  459. <category><![CDATA[Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor]]></category>
  460. <category><![CDATA[Gaza ceasefire]]></category>
  461. <category><![CDATA[Gaza City]]></category>
  462. <category><![CDATA[Marwan Barghouti]]></category>
  463. <category><![CDATA[Ramy Abdu]]></category>
  464. <category><![CDATA[Trump's 20-point “peace plan“]]></category>
  465. <category><![CDATA[Trump’s “Board of Peace”]]></category>
  466. <category><![CDATA[UN’s Genocide Convention]]></category>
  467. <category><![CDATA[“Gaza war”]]></category>
  468. <category><![CDATA[“mowing the lawn”]]></category>
  469. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162371</guid>
  470.  
  471. <description><![CDATA[<p>[First published by Middle East Eye] Ceasefires stick because the two sides in a war have reached military stalemate – or because the incentives for each side in laying down their arms outweigh those of continuing the bloodshed. None of this applies in Gaza. The past two years in the enclave have been many things. But [&#8230;]</p>
  472. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/it-was-never-a-gaza-war-the-ceasefire-is-a-lie-cut-from-the-same-cloth/">It was never a Gaza ‘war’. The ‘ceasefire’ is a lie cut from the same cloth</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  473. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container">
  474. <figure>
  475. <div class="image2-inset">
  476. <picture><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!7L88!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp" sizes="auto, 100vw" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!7L88!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!7L88!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!7L88!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!7L88!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp 1456w" alt="" width="505" height="284" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:788,&quot;width&quot;:1400,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:339296,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/webp&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://jonathancook.substack.com/i/176407104?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3526f9c0-09f8-432e-9c01-788a25719f5f_1400x788.webp&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></picture>
  477. <div class="image-link-expand">
  478. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  479. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  480. <p>[<em>First published by <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/it-was-never-gaza-war-ceasefire-lie-cut-same-clot" rel="">Middle East Eye</a></em>]</p>
  481. <p>Ceasefires stick because the two sides in a war have reached military stalemate – or because the incentives for each side in laying down their arms outweigh those of continuing the bloodshed.</p>
  482. <p>None of this applies in Gaza.</p>
  483. <p>The past two years in the enclave have been many things. But the one thing they have not been is a war, whatever Western politicians and media wish us to believe.</p>
  484. <p>Which means the current narrative of a “ceasefire” is as much a lie as the preceding narrative of a “Gaza war”.</p>
  485. <p>The ceasefire is not “fragile”, as we keep being told. It is non-existent, as evidenced by Israel’s continual violations – from its soldiers continuing to shoot dead Palestinian civilians to its blocking promised aid.</p>
  486. <p>So what is really going on?</p>
  487. <p>To understand the “ceasefire” and US President Donald Trump’s even more deluded 20-point &#8220;<a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/gaza-genocide-two-years-west-deradicalised-never-happens-again%20" rel="">peace plan&#8221;</a>, we first need to make sense of what the earlier “war” rhetoric was used to conceal.</p>
  488. <p>Over the past 24 months, we witnessed something deeply sinister.</p>
  489. <p>We watched the indiscriminate slaughter of a largely civilian population, already under a 17-year siege, by Israel, a regional military goliath supported and armed by the global military goliath of the United States.</p>
  490. <p>We watched the erasure of almost every home in Gaza – in what already amounted to <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2025-10-11/ty-article-magazine/drone-footage-shows-the-extent-of-destruction-in-gaza-city-after-israel-hamas-cease-fire/00000199-d4a6-dde4-a7bd-dcfe73080000" rel="">a concentration camp</a> for its people.</p>
  491. <p>Families were forced into makeshift tents, as they had been when they were expelled decades ago at gunpoint from their lands in what is now Israel—but this time they have been exposed to a toxic brew of the rubble-dust of their former homes and the spent materials from many <a href="https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/damage-gaza-causing-new-risks-human-health-and-long-term-recovery" rel="">Hiroshimas-worth</a> of bombs dropped on the enclave.</p>
  492. <p>We watched a captive population being starved for months on end, in what amounted to, on the most generous view, an undisguised policy of collective punishment – a crime against humanity for which <span style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">the International Criminal Court is pursuing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu</span>.</p>
  493. <p>Hundreds of thousands of children in Gaza have been physically damaged, in addition to their psychological trauma, by a malnourishment that has altered their DNA – damage that will most likely be <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gaza-generations-children-face-lifelong-genetic-damage-israel-genocide" rel="">passed on to future generations</a>.</p>
  494. <p>We watched Gaza’s hospitals being systematically dismantled, one by one, until the entire health sector was hollowed out, unable to deal with either the flood of wounded or the growing tide of malnourished children.</p>
  495. <p>We watched large-scale ethnic cleansing operations, in which families – or what was left of them – were driven out of “kill zones” into areas Israel termed “safe zones”, only for those safe zones to quickly turn, undeclared, into <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/world/middle-east/no-safe-place-left-gaza-israels-humanitarian-zones-shrink-rcna202523" rel="">new kill zones</a>.</p>
  496. <p>And as Trump stepped up the pressure for a “ceasefire”, we watched Israel unleash <a href="https://archive.ph/x9JMZ" rel="">an orgy of violence</a>, destroying as much of Gaza City as it could before the deadline arrived to stop.</p>
  497. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Rhetoric of ‘Gaza war’</strong></h3>
  498. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  499. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  500. <p>None of this can, or should, be described as a war.</p>
  501. </div>
  502. <p>The United Nations, every major human rights organization in the world, including Israel’s B’Tselem, and the world’s <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/top-genocide-scholars-unanimous-israel-committing-genocide-gaza-investigation-finds" rel="">leading body of genocide scholars</a> agree that what has happened in Gaza meets the definition of genocide, as laid out in the UN’s Genocide Convention, ratified by Israel, the US, Britain, and the European Union.</p>
  503. <p>Nonetheless, Israel and the West’s rhetoric about “war” has been crucial in selling to Western publics an equally dishonest rhetoric of a “ceasefire” and hopes for “peace”.</p>
  504. <p>The lie of the current ceasefire is a counterpart of the lie about a “Gaza war” narrated to us over the past two years. The framing serves exactly the same purpose: to disguise Israel’s larger goals.</p>
  505. <p>On Tuesday, in the midst of the “ceasefire”, as the bodies of Israelis and Palestinians were being traded,<strong> </strong>Israel was killing more Palestinians. The Financial Times was among the media outlets <a href="https://x.com/ftworldnews/status/1978061943765193032" rel="">reporting</a> that Israeli soldiers had killed “several” Palestinians that day.</p>
  506. <p>Earlier, Israeli soldiers posted videos as they pulled out of Gaza City of their <a href="https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/israel-idf-soldiers-set-fire-food-homes-sewage-treatment-plan-after-ceasefire-announced%20" rel="">torching homes</a>, food supplies, and a vital sewage treatment plant.</p>
  507. <p>In other words, Israel never had any intention of halting its fire.</p>
  508. <p>This is a familiar pattern.</p>
  509. <p>Israel <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/acaps-briefing-note-palestine-end-ceasefire-and-blockade-gaza-25-march-2025" rel="">killed</a> at least 170 Palestinians during an earlier “ceasefire” negotiated by Trump, in January, which it then unilaterally ended weeks later so that it could revive the genocide.</p>
  510. <p>And in Lebanon, where a ceasefire is supposed to have been in force for the past year, overseen by the United States and France, Israel is recorded to have broken its terms <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/israel-continues-to-bomb-lebanon-despite-truce-will-gaza-be-different-10861067" rel="">more than 4,500 times</a>.</p>
  511. <p>As former British ambassador Craig Murray <a href="https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2025/10/a-warning-from-lebanon/" rel="">observed</a> of the ceasefire period, Israel “has killed hundreds of people, including infants, demolished tens of thousands of homes and annexed five areas of Lebanon”.</p>
  512. <p>Does anyone imagine Gaza, a tiny territory without an army or the trappings of statehood, will fare any better than Lebanon under an Israeli ceasefire?</p>
  513. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Ceasefire charade</strong></h3>
  514. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  515. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  516. <p>The ceasefire may be a temporary lull in Israel’s genocidal, two-year assault on Gaza but it does nothing to cease Israel’s decade-long occupation of the Palestinian territories – the inciting cause of the “war”.</p>
  517. </div>
  518. <p>The occupation continues.</p>
  519. <p>It also does nothing to cease Israel’s system of <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/icj-clears-fog-hiding-western-support-israel-rogue-state" rel="">apartheid rule</a> over Palestinians, judged illegal by the world’s highest court last year.</p>
  520. <p>Then, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) demanded that Israel immediately withdraw from the occupied Palestinian territories, including Gaza, and that other states pressure it into such a withdrawal.</p>
  521. <p>The UN General Assembly <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/09/1154496" rel="">gave</a> Israel till last month to honor the ICJ’s ruling. Israel has not just ignored that deadline. Even during the current “ceasefire”, Israeli soldiers continue to be directly <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgqx7ygq41o" rel="">stationed</a> in more than half of Gaza.</p>
  522. <p>Additionally, of course, Israel still controls all of Gaza’s territory at arm’s length through its spy drones, attack drones and fighter jets, surveillance technology, and land and naval blockades.</p>
  523. <p>It should be a truism that a state bent on genocide has no reason to stop its genocide unless it is forced to do so – by a stronger party.</p>
  524. <p>Trump has been striding the world stage pretending to be doing just that, strong-arming Israel and Hamas. But only the credulous – and the Western political and media class – fall for this charade.</p>
  525. <p>The “ceasefire” is not “fragile”. It was set up to fail, not to provide a path to peace. Its real purpose is to provide Israel with a fresh mandate to renew the genocide.</p>
  526. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Dehumanized prisoners</strong></h3>
  527. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  528. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  529. <p>For decades, Palestinians have been forced to live with a catch-22: damned if they do, damned if they don’t.</p>
  530. </div>
  531. <p>Any resistance to their brutal occupation results in slaughter – or “mowing the lawn”, as Israel terms it – as well as their designation as “terrorists”.</p>
  532. <p><span style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">But a policy of no resistance, as pursued by Mahmoud Abbas’ compliant Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, hangs Palestinians out to dry – living as permanent, dehumanized prisoners under Israeli rule, herded into ever-shrinking reservations while Jewish militias are <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/8/6/israel-pushes-for-more-illegal-settlements-in-occupied-west-bank-amid-raids" target="_blank" rel="noopener">licensed</a> to build settlements on their land.</span></p>
  533. <p>The same kind of bogus “choice” is central to the current “ceasefire”.</p>
  534. <p>Hamas has got a hostage swap – after thousands of Palestinians were seized off the street (and thousands more will soon be seized to replace them) – while the people of Gaza win a brief respite from Israel’s genocidal starvation campaign. That was the formula for cornering Hamas into approving a ceasefire agreement it knows only too well is primed with tripwires.</p>
  535. <p>The most obvious is the requirement on Hamas to return the last remaining Israelis held captive in Gaza, including <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/10/13/explainer-who-are-the-palestinian-captives-israel-released" rel="">28 bodies</a>, in exchange for some 2,000 Palestinian hostages in Israel’s prisons. The agreement set a 72-hour timeframe for the exchange.</p>
  536. <p>Hamas has found it harder to locate the sites of the dead. So far, they have returned 10, though one appears to be non-Israeli.</p>
  537. <p>The wasteland that is now Gaza has few landmarks to identify the locations of original burial sites. And the mountains of rubble under which the Israelis’ bodies lie – created by the US-supplied bunker-busting bombs Israel dropped that most likely killed them – are almost impossible to move without heavy machinery, sorely lacking in Gaza.</p>
  538. <p>Even if the sites can be identified and the rubble removed, Hamas may discover that the bodies no longer exist, that they have been vaporized, alongside Palestinian victims, by Israel’s bombs. And of course, there is a further likely problem: some of the bodies may be located in more than half of Gaza, which Israel is still occupying, and Hamas cannot access.</p>
  539. <p>As the International Committee of the Red Cross, the ultimate neutral arbiter, has <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/returning-hostage-bodies-gaza-may-take-time-red-cross-says-2025-10-14/" rel="">conceded</a>, finding the bodies in these circumstances will be a “massive challenge”.</p>
  540. <p>Another catch-22.</p>
  541. <p><span style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Notably, though the Western media has happily amplified Israeli claims of Hamas&#8217;s bad faith over returning the bodies, as well as the suffering of waiting Israeli families, it has provided <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/captives-hostages-genocide-gaza-western-media-still-privilege-israeli-lives" target="_blank" rel="noopener">little comparable coverage</a> on the condition of the Palestinian bodies returned by Israel.</span></p>
  542. <p>The refrigerated corpses <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/16/hamas-hostage-bodies-recovered-amid-israel-gaza-fighting-ceasefire-deal%20" rel="">arrived</a> at Nasser hospital in Gaza without any form of identification, and with staff there unable to run DNA tests because of the destruction inflicted by Israel on its facilities. Families will have no idea who their loved ones are unless they try to identify them personally.</p>
  543. <p>That will be a gruesome and distressing task. Doctors <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/15/palestinian-bodies-returned-by-israel-show-signs-of-torture-and-execution-say-doctors" rel="">noted</a> that the returned bodies were still cuffed and blindfolded, executed with bullets to the head, and with clear signs that they had been tortured before and after their deaths.</p>
  544. <p>Meanwhile, even before the 72-hour timeframe for the exchange was reached, Israel <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/14/israel-limits-aid-keeps-rafah-crossing-closed-dispute-hostage-remains%20" rel="">exploited</a> the delay to renew the starvation of Gaza, restricting aid desperately needed to address the famine it had engineered.</p>
  545. <p>More ominously, according to <a href="https://mondoweiss.net/2025/10/the-israeli-media-is-reporting-on-a-secret-clause-in-the-gaza-ceasefire-deal-that-no-one-is-talking-about/" rel="">Israeli media reports</a>, the US has agreed to a “secret clause” with Israel to allow it to resume its genocidal “war” if Hamas cannot produce all the bodies within the three-day window.</p>
  546. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Double bind</strong></h3>
  547. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  548. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  549. <p>Then, if Hamas can avoid this tripwire, there is a requirement on the group to lay down its weapons. This is being presented as a precondition for “peace”. But the one certainty is that, even were Hamas to disarm, peace would not be the outcome.</p>
  550. </div>
  551. <p>This week, in his usual style, Trump made <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2025-10-14/ty-article/.premium/trump-hamas-told-me-theyll-disarm-if-they-dont-we-will-perhaps-violently/00000199-e40b-d8a7-afdd-f7bfdf3e0000" rel="">undefined threats</a>.</p>
  552. <p>“If they [Hamas] don’t disarm,” he said, “we will disarm them”. He added that, if the US got involved, “it will happen quickly and perhaps violently. But they will disarm.”</p>
  553. <p>This intentionally puts Hamas and others pursuing armed resistance against Israel’s occupation – a right recognized in international law – in a double bind.</p>
  554. <p>First, a disarmed population in Gaza will be even more defenseless in the face of Israeli attacks.</p>
  555. <p>Whatever the rights or wrongs of Hamas’ military strategy, it is hard to ignore the fact that the prolonged toll of fighting on Israeli troops – in terms of psychological trauma and casualty figures – has served as some sort of countervailing pressure.</p>
  556. <p>Large numbers of Israelis have taken to the streets to oppose Netanyahu’s actions in Gaza – but not, as polls show, because most care about the hundreds of thousands of dead and maimed Palestinians there.</p>
  557. <p>Rather, their protests have been driven by concerns about the plight of Israeli captives in Gaza and about the toll on Israeli soldiers.</p>
  558. <p>Hamas, and many of Gaza’s population, will worry that disarmament would swing the cost-benefit analysis among Israelis even further towards continued genocide. It risks more bloodletting by Israel, not peace.</p>
  559. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Lose-lose conundrum</strong></h3>
  560. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  561. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  562. <p>Second, Hamas is unlikely to agree to disarm when there are criminal clans, armed and backed by Israel, and some of them linked to the Islamic State, roaming Gaza’s streets.</p>
  563. </div>
  564. <p>Palestinians have long understood that Israel’s ambition is to undermine the Palestinians’ major national liberation movements – whether Hamas or Fatah – by promoting in their place feudal warlords.</p>
  565. <p>One Palestinian analyst warned me 14 years ago of the dangers of what he referred to as Israel’s plan for the “<a href="https://www.jonathan-cook.net/2011-01-31/palestinian-authoritys-back-to-wall-after-al-jazeera-revelations/%20" rel="">Afghanistanization”</a> of Gaza and the West Bank.</p>
  566. <p>Israel’s ultimate divide-and-rule strategy would involve promoting rival clan leaders who focus on protecting their own small fiefdoms and fighting each other, rather than trying to resist the illegal occupation and seek a unified Palestinian state.</p>
  567. <p>At the height of the genocide, the clans proved how dangerous such a development could be for ordinary Palestinians. Aided by Israel, and with Hamas pinned down in their tunnels, these gangs <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-07-14/gaza-aid-looting-gangs-yasser-abu-shabab-israel-netanyahu-hamas/105501926" rel="">looted aid trucks</a>, stole aid from weaker families, then took that food for their own families and sold the rest at extortionate prices few could afford. Everyone else starved.</p>
  568. <div class="subscribe-widget is-signed-up" data-component-name="SubscribeWidget">
  569. <div class="pencraft pc-reset button-wrapper">
  570. <p>If Hamas disarms, these clans will have free rein, propped up by Israel. Neither Hamas nor most people in Gaza want to see that happen again. That is not a path to peace, but to continuing brutal Israeli occupation, subcontracted in part to local warlords.</p>
  571. <p>Confusingly, Trump seems to grasp some of this. On Tuesday, he <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/trump-backs-hamas-crackdown-israeli-linked-gangs" rel="">said</a> Hamas “took out a couple of gangs that were very bad… they killed a number of gang members. That didn’t bother me much, to be honest. That’s okay.”</p>
  572. <p>What then does Trump imagine will happen if Hamas lays down its arms, as he and Israel have insisted it does? Will these “very bad gangs” not re-emerge?</p>
  573. <p>That is precisely the lose-lose conundrum Israel wants Hamas and Gaza plunged into.</p>
  574. <h3 class="header-anchor-post"><strong>Muddying the waters</strong></h3>
  575. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  576. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">
  577. <p>On Wednesday, Trump <a href="https://news.antiwar.com/2025/10/15/trump-israel-could-resume-attacks-in-gaza-as-soon-as-i-say-the-word/%20" rel="">muddied</a> the waters again, warning that, if Hamas did not disarm, Israel would resume its attacks on Gaza “as soon as I say the word”.</p>
  578. </div>
  579. <p>The next day, he went further, suggesting the US itself might act in Gaza. He <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115385030312911724" rel="">wrote</a> on his Truth Social: “If Hamas continues to kill people in Gaza, which was not the Deal, we will have no choice but to go in and kill them.”</p>
  580. <p>So what is supposed to fill the vacuum created in the doubly improbable event of Hamas dissolving itself and Israel fully withdrawing from Gaza?</p>
  581. <p>Israel has insisted on no Palestinian governance in the enclave, even from Abbas’ Vichy regime in the West Bank. Israel is also continuing to refuse to release <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/tags/marwan-barghouti" rel="">Marwan Barghouti</a>, the long-jailed Fatah leader who is the sole unifying figure in Palestinian politics and often referred to as the Palestinian Nelson Mandela.</p>
  582. <p>If Israel were really interested in ending the occupation and in “peace”, Barghouti would be the obvious person to call on. Instead, there are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/15/palestinian-leader-marwan-barghouti-assaulted-by-israeli-prison-guards-son-says" rel="">reports</a> that he is, once again, being savagely beaten by Israeli prison guards, putting his life in danger.</p>
  583. <p>Trump’s vision for the next few years offers only his infamous &#8220;<a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/trump-peace-plan-introduced-new-mediators-israel-palestine-conflict" rel="">Board of Peace&#8221;</a> – an unapologetically colonial-style administration expected to be headed by Viceroy <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/breakdown-tony-blairs-bizarre-proposal-run-gaza" rel="">Tony Blair</a>. Two decades ago, the former British prime minister helped the US wreck Iraq, leading to the utter collapse of its institutions and mass death among its population.</p>
  584. <p>Trump’s “Board of Peace” will supposedly sit nearby in Egypt, not in Gaza.</p>
  585. <p>On the ground, Trump envisions<a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/us-talks-five-countries-over-stabilisation-force" rel=""> a foreign “stabilization force</a>“. But its troops, assuming they ever appear, are likely to be no more effective at dealing with Israeli aggression than counterpart peacekeepers in Lebanon have been for decades.</p>
  586. <p>Israel has repeatedly attacked UN peacekeepers in south Lebanon, while the presence of UN forces has done nothing to <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwylekwngz8o%20]" rel="">curb</a> Israel’s continuing “ceasefire” violations.</p>
  587. <p>A stabilization force will be able to do little to stop Israel meddling directly in Gaza through drone assassinations, restrictions on imports of concrete, food, and medical supplies, and a naval blockade of the enclave’s territorial waters.</p>
  588. <p>Trump’s vision of “peace” is of Palestinians eking out a bare existence among Gaza’s ruins, at the mercy of Israel’s ever-watching drones.</p>
  589. <p>Ramy Abdu, chair of Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, <a href="https://theintercept.com/2025/10/15/israel-ceasefire-violations-gaza-aid/" rel="">told</a> the Intercept this week that what we are most likely to see over the coming weeks and months is a move by Israel from wanton genocide to what he called a more “managed genocide, a managed forcible displacement”.</p>
  590. <p>Israel will now be able to sit back, obstruct the rebuilding of the enclave, sending a clear message to a destitute population that their salvation will never be found in Gaza.</p>
  591. <p>The future for the West Bank will not be one of peace either, but of Israel intensifying the atrocities there and creating mini-Gazas out of the small city-reservations into which the Palestinians there have been progressively herded.</p>
  592. <p>Palestinian resistance will not end in such circumstances. No people in history have ever resigned themselves to permanent servitude and oppression. The Palestinians will prove no different.</p>
  593. </div>
  594. </div>
  595. </div>
  596. </div>
  597. </div>
  598. </div>
  599. </div>
  600. </div>
  601. </div>
  602. </div>
  603. </div>
  604. </figure>
  605. </div>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/it-was-never-a-gaza-war-the-ceasefire-is-a-lie-cut-from-the-same-cloth/">It was never a Gaza ‘war’. The ‘ceasefire’ is a lie cut from the same cloth</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  609. </item>
  610. <item>
  611. <title>Terrorists: NOT a Love Story!</title>
  612. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/terrorists-not-a-love-story/</link>
  614. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Philip A. Faruggio]]></dc:creator>
  615. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 15:21:45 +0000</pubDate>
  616. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  617. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
  618. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162349</guid>
  619.  
  620. <description><![CDATA[<p>Being a baby boomer who protested against the Vietnam debacle, what the Trump regime is now doing is disgusting. All this week we see Republican Congressional minions and members of the Trump gang standing in front of cameras calling those who peacefully protest as Terrorists. Webster&#8217;s dictionary defines a terrorist as &#8221; A person who [&#8230;]</p>
  621. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/terrorists-not-a-love-story/">Terrorists: NOT a Love Story!</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  622. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Being a baby boomer who protested against the Vietnam debacle, what the Trump regime is now doing is disgusting. All this week we see Republican Congressional minions and members of the Trump gang standing in front of cameras calling those who peacefully protest as <i>Terrorists. </i>Webster&#8217;s dictionary defines a terrorist as &#8221; <i>A person who uses unlawful violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.&#8221;</i> The sad irony is that it was the mob on January 6th, 2021 at the Capitol building who acted like terrorists, especially when they invaded the legislative chambers using their violence and intimidation against the Congress people (civilians). That day alone added up to the need for the Department of Justice to indict Trump once he was no longer president. A more recent irony is how many of the ICE agents, hiding their faces, have used <i>terrorist acts </i>against civilians? I ask any decent and law abiding American &#8216; How can they make these types of people into ICE agents?&#8217; <i>Storm trooper </i>would be a better term for them.</p>
  623. <p>So, this Saturday there are plans nationwide, and even <i>worldwide, </i>for peaceful protests encompassing millions upon millions, once again declaring &#8216;No Kings&#8217;. Imagine the utter audacity of this president, led by his inner circle, to consider using the <i>Insurrection Act </i>of 1807. The few times in our recent past that it was used was when Presidents Eisenhower and JFK used it to enforce desegregation laws in certain Southern states when violent mobs of whites were threatening black citizens. It was used after Hurricane Hugo in 1989 when looting was excessively prevalent, and in Los Angeles in 1992 during the violent riots after the Rodney King case set free the LAPD cops who savaged him, after being caught on video.</p>
  624. <p>When the group I had organized in 2004 to protest the illegal ( and immoral) invasion and occupation of Iraq, we stood peacefully on the same street corner each Tuesday at rush hour. One week, we had visits from more than one police officer as we found our spots on that corner. First they informed us <i>incorrectly </i>that we &#8216; Had to keep moving our picket line&#8217;. They went away when told that this was not a strike, rather a demonstration. Then a supervisor drove up and told us that &#8220;We got a call that you folks are going out into the road and hassling the motorists.&#8221; A lie and he then disappeared. I immediately called our city&#8217;s mayor (a diehard libertarian) and complained to him. He said, &#8220;Phil, you folks have been out there peacefully for weeks. You have every right to protest and I&#8217;m going to call the police chief and smash this nonsense.&#8221; And he did.</p>
  625. <p>Perhaps it&#8217;s time for all those so called Republican libertarians and civil liberty backers to get off their asses and let Trump and company know how they feel, before this goes way too far.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/terrorists-not-a-love-story/">Terrorists: NOT a Love Story!</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  629. </item>
  630. <item>
  631. <title>The Masks Have Come Off</title>
  632. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-masks-have-come-off/</link>
  634. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Edward Curtin]]></dc:creator>
  635. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 15:04:48 +0000</pubDate>
  636. <category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
  637. <category><![CDATA[CIA]]></category>
  638. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  639. <category><![CDATA[Fascism]]></category>
  640. <category><![CDATA[Freedom]]></category>
  641. <category><![CDATA[Ronald Reagan]]></category>
  642. <category><![CDATA[War]]></category>
  643. <category><![CDATA[Bertolt Brecht]]></category>
  644. <category><![CDATA[Kris Kristofferson]]></category>
  645. <category><![CDATA[megalomania]]></category>
  646. <category><![CDATA[Neil Postman]]></category>
  647. <category><![CDATA[PATRIOT Act]]></category>
  648. <category><![CDATA[screen culture]]></category>
  649. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162351</guid>
  650.  
  651. <description><![CDATA[<p>If you believe what is written on those hats worn in the Israeli Knesset – “Trump the Peace President” – you are deluded beyond hope. Halloween may be coming, but you don’t need a frightening mask to realize the horrors that confront us. Trump is the culmination of a long developing horror story. Unlike his [&#8230;]</p>
  652. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-masks-have-come-off/">The Masks Have Come Off</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  653. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>If you believe what is written on those hats worn in the Israeli Knesset – “<a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/09/five-actions-that-definitively-disqualify-trump-for-his-coveted-nobel-peace-prize/">Trump the Peace President</a>” – you are deluded beyond hope. Halloween may be coming, but you don’t need a frightening mask to realize the horrors that confront us. Trump is the culmination of a long developing horror story. Unlike his predecessors who prepared the way for him and who generally wore traditionally allaying masks to hide their evil actions, he is the greatest blatant fraud to ever occupy the White House. He is a war monger, a genocidal killer, and an enemy of people home and abroad so obvious, so capricious, so erratic – a man of endless threats – that no one should be surprised to wake up one morning to news that might seem “shocking.” Everyone should expect surprises, not treats but tricks.</p>
  654. <p>Trump is like an advertisement that tells you its characters are not ordinary people but actors and their spiel isn’t true – only to tell you to buy the product they are pitching. Every pitch Trump throws is a curve ball.</p>
  655. <p>The only way his schtick can be explained is that he is the culmination of a decades’ long development in American culture where acting is presented as so fake that the audience thinks it’s real because of its fakery. He is a dangerous joke, and all the more dangerous because he fits so comfortably into the larger cultural development that Neil Postman in 1985 aptly termed <em>Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business</em> and Neal Gabler later called <em>Life:The Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality</em>.</p>
  656. <p>He is the culmination of the latent stream of despotism that has flowed through American history, especially during the last twenty-five years, but which many see as only a battle between political parties, the so-called good and bad. They fail to see that fascism is like a castle that takes years to build from the foundation up, and it necessitates the slow acceptance by all shades of political opinion of the gradual loss of fundamental freedoms, the acceptance of a corporate warfare state, and a secret government lodged in “intelligence” agencies such as the CIA, the NSA, and the DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency), working hand-in-glove with the major media and Silicon Valley corporations in their partnerships to propagandize and spy on the public.</p>
  657. <p>Someone like Trump is not hatched overnight. His progenitors are all those bipartisan sycophants who have accepted the official explanation of 9/11 and the immediate institution of the Patriot Act (prepared during the Clinton administration), the national state of emergency declared by George W. Bush on September 14, 2001 and renewed annually since, the wars against Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Russia, Iran, the Palestinians, etc. (wars launched and supported by Republicans and Democrats), the bailout of the Big Banks and financial institutions in 2009, the 2014 U.S. coup against the Ukrainian government, the so-called war against terror, the Russiagate fraud, the extrajudicial murders by U.S. presidents, the endless propaganda, the growth of Public/private “partnerships” that have privatized government services, the COVID lies, the new Cold War, and the enormous influence of Israel within the U.S. government, etc. The list is extensive. Trump the chickenshit despot did not hatch overnight; he is the chicken come home to roost.</p>
  658. <p>“But what happens,” writes Gary Wills in <em>Reagan’s America: Innocents at Home,</em> “if when we look into our historical rear view mirror, all we can see is a movie?”</p>
  659. <p>Fascism is often accompanied by a dreamy complacency and Hollywood effects, such as with <em>Triumph of the Will</em>, Leni Riefenstahl’s 1935 Nazi propaganda film, commissioned by Adolf Hitler. Today screen culture dominates people’s thinking night and day, and images and digital videos accompany their day and night dreams. As a reality-TV actor, Trump is the perfect embodiment of this screen culture. Everyone is now waiting for something to culminate in their celluloid illusions, some denouement in a horror picture show, as in Poe’s <em>The House of Usher. </em></p>
  660. <p>The German playwright Bertolt Brecht said: “To understand fascism you have to understand capitalism from whence it springs.” Capitalism’s spring is its need to create inequality between the haves and the have nots. Once that becomes threatened, capitalism metamorphosizes into outright totalitarianism.</p>
  661. <p>It was in 1985, the year of “amusing ourselves to death,” that Donald Trump, a fake-estate developer, acquired the Atlantic City Hilton Hotel and renamed it Trump’s Castle, a sign of his obsessive megalomania. Trump’s homage to himself went into bankruptcy seven years later, forecasting the future fate of the USA. It was the first year of the second term of Ronald Reagan, a former actor who was called the acting President by his critics. But Reagan himself was proud of his acting; he thought it served him well in the White House, as Gary Wills writes in <em>Reagan’s America: Innocents at Home</em>.</p>
  662. <p>Trump makes Reagan look genuine as hell. Everything about Trump is kitsch, fake in every way, a copy of a copy of a copy in a culture of the copy. But that is his appeal to those who can’t distinguish between illusion and reality. Is it the ridiculous reality-TV guy firing people left and right or really the President of the United States?  It is most apt they he has returned to the presidency as Artificial Intelligence has come to prominence.</p>
  663. <p>At 5:16 P.M. on November 9, 1965 in New York City, I stepped out of an IRT # 4 Subway car on the elevated outdoor station at 161st overlooking Yankee Stadium and all the lights went out throughout the northeastern United States. Such things happen when we least expect it. One rat can spend years building a house of cards to his own glorification, but another rat can turn the lights out and bring it down in one night, as Kris Kristofferson sings in <em>Darby’s Castle</em>.</p>
  664. <p>One can be certain that behind the walls of America’s Potemkin Village, the ruling rats are fighting among themselves for dominance, and the public – whether they dwell in the doll’s house of illusion, still thinking things are good under Trump, or fear much worse to come – will one day awaken to a great surprise. “But it only took one night to bring it down /  When Darby’s castle tumbled to the ground.”</p>
  665. <p>Whether that surprise will just be Darby’s personal Castle falling, or the U.S. and world economy, or our semblance of democracy, or the entire world under falling nuclear missiles, no one can say. But like a jack-in-the box that has never been opened, when that handle is turned by sinister forces in the darkness of night, we will wake up to a great shock. For the masks have come off.</p>
  666. <blockquote><p>Oh, it took three hundred days<br />
  667. For the timbers to be raised<br />
  668. And the silhouette was seen for miles around<br />
  669. And the gables reached as high<br />
  670. As the eagles in the sky<br />
  671. But it only took one night to bring it down<br />
  672. When Darby’s castle tumbled to the ground</p></blockquote>
  673. <p><iframe loading="lazy" title="Kris Kristofferson - &quot;Darby&#039;s Castle&quot; [Live from Austin, TX]" width="500" height="375" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RMfYMZ0nl8s?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
  674. <p>&nbsp;</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-masks-have-come-off/">The Masks Have Come Off</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  678. </item>
  679. <item>
  680. <title>Basta! This Land is YOUR Land, Hermanos y Hermanas</title>
  681. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/basta-this-land-is-your-land-hermanos-y-hermanas/</link>
  683. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Paul Haeder]]></dc:creator>
  684. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 15:01:17 +0000</pubDate>
  685. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  686. <category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
  687. <category><![CDATA[Colonialism]]></category>
  688. <category><![CDATA[Courts and Judges]]></category>
  689. <category><![CDATA[Fascism]]></category>
  690. <category><![CDATA[Fearmongering]]></category>
  691. <category><![CDATA[History]]></category>
  692. <category><![CDATA[Migration/Migrants]]></category>
  693. <category><![CDATA[Original Peoples]]></category>
  694. <category><![CDATA[Socialism]]></category>
  695. <category><![CDATA[Turtle Island]]></category>
  696. <category><![CDATA[Annunciation House]]></category>
  697. <category><![CDATA[Cesar Chavez]]></category>
  698. <category><![CDATA[Dolores Huerta]]></category>
  699. <category><![CDATA[good Samaritan]]></category>
  700. <category><![CDATA[James Kirker]]></category>
  701. <category><![CDATA[Jim Sensenbrenner]]></category>
  702. <category><![CDATA[John Coffee Hays]]></category>
  703. <category><![CDATA[judges]]></category>
  704. <category><![CDATA[Lakota Sioux]]></category>
  705. <category><![CDATA[Mike Fish]]></category>
  706. <category><![CDATA[Minutemen]]></category>
  707. <category><![CDATA[PCUN]]></category>
  708. <category><![CDATA[politicians]]></category>
  709. <category><![CDATA[undocumented humanity]]></category>
  710. <category><![CDATA[universal human rights]]></category>
  711. <category><![CDATA[William S. Kiser]]></category>
  712. <category><![CDATA[Wounded Knee]]></category>
  713. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162286</guid>
  714.  
  715. <description><![CDATA[<p>I had Alexis Lisandro Guizar-Diaz, M.S. on my studio recorder today, but it airs Nov. 20 on KYAQ. He’s the Electoral Field Director PCUN. LISTEN HERE! &#160; April 1985 PCUN is founded as Oregon’s union for farmworkers and treeplanters. WVIP continues its service and immigration work through PCUN’s Service Center for Farmworkers. 1986 The Immigration Reform and [&#8230;]</p>
  716. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/basta-this-land-is-your-land-hermanos-y-hermanas/">Basta! This Land is YOUR Land, Hermanos y Hermanas</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  717. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="postContentWrapper-MYe7fH">
  718. <div class="available-content">
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  720. <div class="captioned-image-container">
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  722. <div class="image2-inset">
  723. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!FSS8!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F36adddd1-5f49-4b5f-b4dc-79a7f7656282_1904x372.png" alt="" width="404" height="79" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/36adddd1-5f49-4b5f-b4dc-79a7f7656282_1904x372.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:284,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:1093431,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F36adddd1-5f49-4b5f-b4dc-79a7f7656282_1904x372.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  724. <div></div>
  725. </div>
  726. </figure>
  727. </div>
  728. <p>I had Alexis Lisandro Guizar-Diaz, M.S. on my studio recorder today, but it airs Nov. 20 on KYAQ. He’s the Electoral Field Director PCUN.</p>
  729. <p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wyY3BpANKKsxEHrRKCA59nmP8GgAbc81/view?usp=drive_link">LISTEN HERE!</a></p>
  730. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  731. <figure>
  732. <div class="image2-inset">
  733. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Qwfm!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F23f89981-52d5-450e-b09b-c87095bb3da4_1000x1000.png" alt="" width="382" height="382" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/23f89981-52d5-450e-b09b-c87095bb3da4_1000x1000.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1000,&quot;width&quot;:1000,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:622,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  734. </div>
  735. </figure>
  736. </div>
  737. <blockquote><p>&nbsp;</p></blockquote>
  738. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  739. <figure>
  740. <div class="image2-inset">
  741. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!HU_7!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4d865fa9-8736-47e9-bd2c-f59c985eab47_300x225.jpeg" alt="" width="303" height="227" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4d865fa9-8736-47e9-bd2c-f59c985eab47_300x225.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:225,&quot;width&quot;:300,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  742. <div></div>
  743. </div>
  744. </figure>
  745. </div>
  746. <p><strong>April 1985</strong> PCUN is founded as Oregon’s union for farmworkers and treeplanters. WVIP continues its service and immigration work through PCUN’s Service Center for Farmworkers.</p>
  747. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  748. <figure>
  749. <div class="image2-inset">
  750. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pt__!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F44c92314-2e49-4134-ba17-82faa79eb9c4_300x254.jpeg" alt="" width="300" height="254" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/44c92314-2e49-4134-ba17-82faa79eb9c4_300x254.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:254,&quot;width&quot;:300,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  751. <div class="image-link-expand">
  752. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  753. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  754. </div>
  755. </div>
  756. </div>
  757. </figure>
  758. </div>
  759. <p><strong>1986</strong> The Immigration Reform and Control Act is signed into law, allowing all those who had been living undocumented in the United States since Jan. 1, 1982 or who had worked in agriculture for ninety days between May 1, 1985 and May 1, 1986, to apply for residency.</p>
  760. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  761. <figure>
  762. <div class="image2-inset">
  763. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!_tam!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F39a2ca41-aad2-4080-bc9c-880488fb7a53_300x211.jpeg" alt="" width="300" height="211" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/39a2ca41-aad2-4080-bc9c-880488fb7a53_300x211.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:211,&quot;width&quot;:300,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  764. <div></div>
  765. </div>
  766. </figure>
  767. </div>
  768. <p>I met Alexis in Salem at a Chicano-Latinix arts event:</p>
  769. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  770. <figure>
  771. <div class="image2-inset">
  772. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IXuR!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb7359f23-4aae-431c-86a4-daeabe38ffb5_2560x1707.jpeg" alt="" width="399" height="266" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/b7359f23-4aae-431c-86a4-daeabe38ffb5_2560x1707.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:971,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  773. <div class="image-link-expand">
  774. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
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  776. </div>
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  784. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!xOxP!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fde891ea2-0d63-432d-9002-dd4e83305658_2560x1610.jpeg" alt="" width="438" height="276" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/de891ea2-0d63-432d-9002-dd4e83305658_2560x1610.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:916,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  796. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!uSTG!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F90bb23fd-96ed-40b3-97c6-11c75e4d36a4_2560x1707.jpeg" alt="" width="428" height="285" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/90bb23fd-96ed-40b3-97c6-11c75e4d36a4_2560x1707.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:971,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  808. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="PHOTOS: Urban Art Fest 2025 celebrates culture - Salem Reporter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pnTQ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa9ca05c2-fffe-41b4-9e73-85805f6d9690_1024x683.jpeg" alt="PHOTOS: Urban Art Fest 2025 celebrates culture - Salem Reporter" width="435" height="290" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/a9ca05c2-fffe-41b4-9e73-85805f6d9690_1024x683.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:683,&quot;width&quot;:1024,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;PHOTOS: Urban Art Fest 2025 celebrates culture - Salem Reporter&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  820. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!0VPz!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F66b8b36d-775a-4035-9b7a-b31f0ff926f2_690x486.png" alt="" width="426" height="300" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/66b8b36d-775a-4035-9b7a-b31f0ff926f2_690x486.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:486,&quot;width&quot;:690,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:663744,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F66b8b36d-775a-4035-9b7a-b31f0ff926f2_690x486.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  827. </figure>
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  831. <div class="image2-inset">
  832. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!bpWT!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F463fa984-ee33-4da6-8ae4-bddd065d1309_685x468.png" alt="" width="391" height="267" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/463fa984-ee33-4da6-8ae4-bddd065d1309_685x468.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:468,&quot;width&quot;:685,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:566906,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F463fa984-ee33-4da6-8ae4-bddd065d1309_685x468.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  838. </div>
  839. </figure>
  840. </div>
  841. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  842. <figure>
  843. <div class="image2-inset">
  844. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!HIWv!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fcd9a1309-059e-470d-8611-e06889d3982d_669x495.png" alt="" width="383" height="283" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/cd9a1309-059e-470d-8611-e06889d3982d_669x495.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:495,&quot;width&quot;:669,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:612097,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fcd9a1309-059e-470d-8611-e06889d3982d_669x495.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  848. </div>
  849. </div>
  850. </div>
  851. </figure>
  852. </div>
  853. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  854. <figure>
  855. <div class="image2-inset">
  856. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!BD98!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5ca0990b-a83e-4f4f-aa3a-05df44129b85_628x399.png" alt="" width="428" height="272" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/5ca0990b-a83e-4f4f-aa3a-05df44129b85_628x399.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:399,&quot;width&quot;:628,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:507961,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5ca0990b-a83e-4f4f-aa3a-05df44129b85_628x399.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  857. <div class="image-link-expand">
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  860. </div>
  861. </div>
  862. </div>
  863. </figure>
  864. </div>
  865. <p>We talked in a wide-ranging manner about settler colonialism, the attack on immigrants, his own doubts about a PhD program at Portland State University. He’s the son of undocumented immigrants, and his first point of college was around becoming a lawyer, an immigration lawyer, but he’s into ecology of economy and urban planning on a meta level.</p>
  866. <p>While talking with him, I sent him a few pieces of mine:</p>
  867. <p><a href="https://www.laprogressive.com/immigration-reform/love-thy-neighbor" rel="">Love Thy Neighbor — One Woman’s Fight for Her Husband</a></p>
  868. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  869. <figure>
  870. <div class="image2-inset">
  871. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="Love Thy Neighbor" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!28_z!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F0aeb08b7-6a77-4cc5-8b7d-11bc2a2b9a67_900x1200.jpeg" alt="Love Thy Neighbor" width="409" height="545" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/0aeb08b7-6a77-4cc5-8b7d-11bc2a2b9a67_900x1200.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1200,&quot;width&quot;:900,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;Love Thy Neighbor&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  875. </div>
  876. </div>
  877. </div>
  878. </figure>
  879. </div>
  880. <p><a href="https://www.laprogressive.com/immigration-reform/family-independence-initiative" rel="">Makwirituni Erakuni – “I’d Like to Introduce You to My family”</a></p>
  881. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  882. <figure>
  883. <div class="image2-inset">
  884. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="erukuni 720" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!lhyx!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F22882457-4195-4621-a701-f005302cc342_1200x795.jpeg" alt="erukuni 720" width="411" height="272" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/22882457-4195-4621-a701-f005302cc342_1200x795.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:795,&quot;width&quot;:1200,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;erukuni 720&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  888. </div>
  889. </div>
  890. </div>
  891. </figure>
  892. </div>
  893. <p><a href="https://www.streetroots.org/news/2020/06/27/opinion-american-story-working-undocumented" rel="">An American story of working undocumented</a></p>
  894. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  895. <figure>
  896. <div class="image2-inset">
  897. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="Enrique as a child" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!rAgG!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a9c46dc-b532-4b58-9b3b-2eb04d6926a9_855x884.png" alt="Enrique as a child" width="410" height="423" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/1a9c46dc-b532-4b58-9b3b-2eb04d6926a9_855x884.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:884,&quot;width&quot;:855,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;Enrique as a child&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  900. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  901. </div>
  902. </div>
  903. </div>
  904. </figure>
  905. </div>
  906. <p>Twenty Years ago, over at <em>Dissident Voice</em>:</p>
  907. <p><a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/Apr06/Haeder07.htm" rel="">This Land is Their Land, and We Are the Illegal Aliens</a></p>
  908. <div class="pullquote">
  909. <p>“We are all illegal aliens.”</p>
  910. </div>
  911. <p>It’s a bumper sticker many of us on the frontlines of the fight against the United States’ government’s assault on Central Americans plastered on our car bumpers down El Paso way.</p>
  912. <p>That was in the 1980s.</p>
  913. <p>You know, when Reagan was running amuck ordering his captains Ollie North, McFarland, Casper Weinberger, the whole lot of them, to send bombs, CIA-torture manuals and US agents in order to aid terrorist contras and other despotic sorts in killing hundreds of thousands of innocents in civil wars in Salvador and Guatemala and El Salvador.</p>
  914. <p>We worked with women and children who had witnessed fathers, uncles and husbands eviscerated by US-backed military monsters. Victims of torture, in Texas illegally. You know, what those brave Smith and Wesson-brandishing, chaise lounge Minutemen of today would call <em>aliens.</em></p>
  915. <p>We worked with people in faith-based communities, mainstream churches, and non-profits throughout El Paso, Juarez and the general area known as <em>La Frontera</em>. Everyone I met working with in this refugee assistance stint had humanitarian blood coursing through their veins. We were proud of our law-breaking work &#8212; we gave refuge to terrorized and sometimes half-dead civilians.</p>
  916. <p>We were called lawbreakers by the Reaganites and the Minutemen of that time. Communists. Pinko-fags. Those were the good old days of low-tech surveillance and simple FBI lists.</p>
  917. <p>But what we did was human and humane, in the tradition of that very universal (with roots in Quakerism) belief in bearing witness and acting upon that which has been judged as unjust and inhumane.</p>
  918. <p>Of course, we were up against the laws of this land and coarse politically driven judges who denied victim after victim permanent or temporary status while seeking asylum in the US.</p>
  919. <p>We have so many stories of people sent back who were at best imprisoned, and in the worse cases, mutilated, disappeared, and murdered.</p>
  920. <p>Guatemalan and Salvadorans, that is. Your readers don’t want to hear the narratives and visualize the descriptions of photos of those victims of torture. Ghastly things happened to teachers, nuns, medical workers and farmers, more heinous than what we’ve heard happened in the cells of Abu Ghraib.</p>
  921. <p>We were there to assist, but more importantly to bear witness to our country’s terror campaign. Some of us got so riled up that later in our lives &#8212; me included &#8212; we hoofed it to Central America. Kicked around. Wrote articles for the few newspapers in this country that even cared about poor, misbegotten, displaced people of Latin America.</p>
  922. <p>But no matter how hard-nosed we became, or how much we could withstand the photographs of women’s sliced backs and beheaded fetuses, we couldn’t shake the images of the children of torture at this two-story refugee house, Annunciation House. It was full of scruffy looking East Coast volunteers who had hooked up with Ruben Garcia, the House’s director, through Catholic services organizations. It was their stint with public service, their spiritual duty calling. Part of their degree plans. But most were converted and slammed hard by the violence their charges had suffered under.</p>
  923. <p>Those PTSD-induced cartoons those children drew sucked the air out of even the hard-ass border patrol guys who used to “dump” the Central Americans at Ruben’s door at all hours of the night. Who can believe it now, that once upon a time official INS and border patrol officers knowingly let their perps go &#8212; knew that Ruben and his volunteers could salve emotional and physical wounds of these tortured crossers.</p>
  924. <p>Their chance at freedom. Except for the piss-ant judges. And the memories of pregnant aunties being <a href="https://nacla.org/indigenous-women-survivors-guatemalas-rape-camps-seek-justice/">raped, their fetuses cut out alive, speared</a>, and the laughing Reagan-loved military punks in the highlands and jungle.</p>
  925. <p>Annunciation House was bulging at 100 people &#8212; disheveled lives jammed in. Beans always cooking. Songs. Mattresses and piles of donated clothes. Guitars strumming. <em>Gueros</em>, the white ones, and the Chicanos would help with in-takes &#8212; asylum transcripts, translation, dotting all the i’s and t’s. Help with getting jobs. Odd jobs in the community. Help with making sure the refugees didn’t get caught again.</p>
  926. <p>But it was always those by-the-letter-of-the-law jurists helping confound the torture. More than 70 percent of our brothers and sisters seeking asylum in the US were denied entry by some fat cat, cocaine-sniffing immigration judge who usually had a friend in the back pocket of some Bush or buddy of Bush somewhere.</p>
  927. <p>Then it was trying to get the denied victims off to Canada without being caught. You remember, the Canada back then which used to open its borders to refugees.</p>
  928. <p>The judges and politicians and Minutemen all professed, “Send them back. Those aliens broke our immigration laws.”</p>
  929. <p>But “we are all illegal aliens” as a rejoinder went much further than USA’s mayhem in Mesoamerica. We worked in solidarity with the housekeepers, bricklayers, agricultural workers and so many other worthy Mexicans who worked their butts off in the US for little pay and much less respect.</p>
  930. <p>These were workers who crossed the Rio Grande to find low-paying jobs with American families and businesses &#8212; working for mayors, bigwigs, even on government contracts. In Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, elsewhere. With a wink and a smile by the American exploiters.</p>
  931. <p><em>Mojado </em>&#8212; wetback. Squatter. Beaner. Illegal alien. These were the more tame epithets.</p>
  932. <p>But let’s not kid ourselves about the genesis of this new round of empowered Latinos fighting against racist laws put forward by the dispassionate conservatives running the ship of fools in DC.</p>
  933. <p>This is not a country of legal immigrants. It’s a country based on colonialists, undocumented white people who helped displace native tribes through broken laws and genocide.</p>
  934. <p>It’s a country based on illegal occupation of native lands and on Mexico’s lands, pure and simple. Colonialists protected by Federal laws that deemed free white people as the only ones who had the right to be fully-fledged citizens.</p>
  935. <p>Manifest destiny was a violent racist act to seize lands illegally. Everything this country’s current anti-Mexican and pro-Apartheid border war proponents stand upon &#8212; all that doctrine and those so-called laws &#8212; is based on illegally seizing lands of Native tribes.</p>
  936. <p>And worse &#8212; laws that “removed” natives. Laws that starved natives. Laws that approved of eradicating native families, entire tribes.</p>
  937. <p>The current massive turnout of students and workers alike in this country’s major cities is a testament to these Americans’ backbone to fight this new exclusionary law &#8212; HR4377 &#8212; a Washington, DC-inspired racist act that has its roots in the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.</p>
  938. <p>Many Americans do express a certain humanity and dignity for the people many deem aliens, but it’s not awe-inspiring that some citizens of Denmark or Limerick, Ireland, obey the so-called immigration laws of this country during their initial years as landed immigrants.</p>
  939. <p>Let’s make no bones about the motives of Jim Sensenbrenner, the author of this racist House bill: He sees those brown-skinned south-of-the-border lettuce pickers, linen washers, house framers, and their US-borne children as, what? “Alien gang members terrorizing communities.”</p>
  940. <p>Anyone spouting that we are a nation of immigrants and laws has a disease, what George Orwell called the illness of doublethink.</p>
  941. <p>And until those many white Americans stop spewing that this is their land, a land of their laws, and a land made for Christians, the racist Minutemen will ramp up their gun brandishing on the southern and northern borders. And racist politicians will continue to play on the fears of uniformed constituents and try and pass the 21st Century’s racist exclusionary laws.</p>
  942. <p>I wonder what these modern-day Nazis would say about those children’s cartoons &#8212; images of bodies floating in rivers. Blood-soaked church walls. Military men with their M-16s trained on men while others were in their rape hunch. Beautiful jungle birds flying in the sky next to US-paid-for helicopter gunships spraying the corn fields below. Dead mommies cradling dead babies.</p>
  943. <p>Yeah, I’m an illegal alien. We all are illegal aliens, under the laws of these creeps in high office. Humanity and caring and simple benedictions for suffering so much, those are alien traits only held by a minority in this country of exclusion. Yeah, those creeps on hate-radio and in the newspaper columns and on Capitol Hill, sure, they recognize all of us who see the lies and fight the injustice as aliens.</p>
  944. <p>And the children whose post-traumatic cartoons brought tears to men and women who had been in Vietnam. Simple Crayola colorings brought tears to a county sheriff who had survived drug runners shooting up his town and unearthed bodies.</p>
  945. <p>Yeah, we are all illegal aliens. Except them.</p>
  946. <p><em><strong>Paul Haeder </strong>worked in Central America and Mexico writing for newspapers during the 1980s and early 1990s. He’s currently in Spokane, Washington, as an instructor of writing at Spokane Falls Community College and writes sustainability-energy-environmental pieces for the towns weekly, Pacific Northwest Inlander.</em></p>
  947. <p style="text-align: center;">*****</p>
  948. <p>Listen to Alexis, man, because he is spot on, one of the good guys who should be in high office changing the smear of the Democrats and Republicans, both parties of KKK and lynching cunts and dirty slavers.</p>
  949. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  950. <figure>
  951. <div class="image2-inset">
  952. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="A person holding an object AI-generated content may be incorrect." src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!fgWX!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9c845c4f-9583-465a-8335-10c51cc1f7f6_1024x535.jpeg" alt="A person holding an object AI-generated content may be incorrect." width="431" height="225" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/9c845c4f-9583-465a-8335-10c51cc1f7f6_1024x535.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:535,&quot;width&quot;:1024,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;A person holding an object\n\nAI-generated content may be incorrect.&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  954. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  955. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  956. </div>
  957. </div>
  958. </div>
  959. </figure>
  960. </div>
  961. <p><a href="https://jeremykuzmarov.substack.com/p/donald-trump-wants-to-take-us-back" rel="">Jeremy Kuzmarov has a new piece out — a new book with all the gory facts which will not be taught in K12, or colleges:</a></p>
  962. <p>In May, President Donald Trump <a href="https://apnews.com/article/indigenous-peoples-columbus-day-donald-trump-96cc6fb0a2251a66876b28372da87b50" rel="">announced</a> that he would not recognize Indigenous People’s Day and would bring Columbus Day “back from the ashes.”</p>
  963. <p>A few months later, War Secretary Pete Hegseth <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2025/09/30/kilt-s30.html" rel="">announced</a> that 20 U.S. soldiers who took part in the massacre of hundreds of Lakota Sioux at Wounded Knee in December 1890 will keep the Medals of Honor they were awarded. Hegseth <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2025/09/30/kilt-s30.html" rel="">said</a> that the soldiers “deserved those medals.”</p>
  964. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  965. <figure>
  966. <div class="image2-inset">
  967. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Nxvw!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c6dace4-b7b2-48c0-8b3c-d4e9c3bd3ae7_1280x720.png" alt="" width="411" height="231" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4c6dace4-b7b2-48c0-8b3c-d4e9c3bd3ae7_1280x720.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:720,&quot;width&quot;:1280,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  970. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  971. </div>
  972. </div>
  973. </div>
  974. </figure>
  975. </div>
  976. <p>Indian killers or Slave killers or BIPOC killers, this is the regime, and every fucking MAGA cunt now needs to be mowed down, really.</p>
  977. <p>Kirk, or Kirker, take your pick: James Kirker, who was a homicidal racist and prolific Indian killer.</p>
  978. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  979. <figure>
  980. <div class="image2-inset">
  981. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="A person with his arms crossed AI-generated content may be incorrect." src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!3aJ-!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3d330438-e5af-4b34-8059-700e47b6da4a_780x1021.jpeg" alt="A person with his arms crossed AI-generated content may be incorrect." width="442" height="578" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3d330438-e5af-4b34-8059-700e47b6da4a_780x1021.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1021,&quot;width&quot;:780,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;A person with his arms crossed\n\nAI-generated content may be incorrect.&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  982. <div class="image-link-expand">
  983. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  984. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  985. </div>
  986. </div>
  987. </div>
  988. </figure>
  989. </div>
  990. <p>Along with slavery, the massacre of the Native-American population has by now been well documented. It has been made even more clear in a number of new historical studies that take on a subversive air under the Trump-led order.</p>
  991. <p>One of these studies, by William S. Kiser, Chair of the History Department at Texas A&amp;M-San Antonio, methodically details how white soldiers serving with colonial militias and state police agencies like the Texas Rangers were paid bounties for Native-American scalps and other body parts, which they often took as trophies.</p>
  992. <p>Kiser’s book was published this year in the prestigious Lamar Series in Western History with Yale University Press and is entitled <em>The Business of Killing Indians: Scalp Warfare and the Violent Conquest of North America.</em></p>
  993. <p>Kiser estimates—conservatively—that between ten and twenty thousand Native Americans were scalped over a 250-year period from the mid-1600s to the late 1800s</p>
  994. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  995. <figure>
  996. <div class="image2-inset">
  997. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="A group of men on horses and bodies AI-generated content may be incorrect." src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!iQll!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F950da765-52bf-406c-8d96-d38c43c421c7_592x459.jpeg" alt="A group of men on horses and bodies AI-generated content may be incorrect." width="436" height="338" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/950da765-52bf-406c-8d96-d38c43c421c7_592x459.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:459,&quot;width&quot;:592,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;A group of men on horses and bodies\n\nAI-generated content may be incorrect.&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  1000. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1001. </div>
  1002. </div>
  1003. </div>
  1004. </figure>
  1005. </div>
  1006. <p>[Texas Rangers with three “bandits” that they killed on the Mexican border.]</p>
  1007. <p><iframe loading="lazy" title="We don&#039;t need no stinking badges!" width="500" height="375" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VqomZQMZQCQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
  1008. <div id="youtube2-VqomZQMZQCQ" class="youtube-wrap" data-attrs="{&quot;videoId&quot;:&quot;VqomZQMZQCQ&quot;,&quot;startTime&quot;:null,&quot;endTime&quot;:null}" data-component-name="Youtube2ToDOM">
  1009. <div class="youtube-inner"></div>
  1010. </div>
  1011. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  1012. <figure>
  1013. <div class="image2-inset">
  1014. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ccNB!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F81a4e065-d107-4ea3-982b-fc2361e152bf_768x1024.png" alt="" width="407" height="543" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/81a4e065-d107-4ea3-982b-fc2361e152bf_768x1024.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:1024,&quot;width&quot;:768,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  1015. <div class="image-link-expand">
  1016. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  1017. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1018. </div>
  1019. </div>
  1020. </div>
  1021. </figure>
  1022. </div>
  1023. <p class="header-anchor-post" style="text-align: center;"><strong>WHAT IS PCUN?</strong></p>
  1024. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-alignItems-center pc-position-absolute pc-reset header-anchor-parent">
  1025. <div class="pencraft pc-display-contents pc-reset pubTheme-yiXxQA">Our mission is to empower farmworkers and working Latinx families in Oregon by building community, increasing Latinx representation in elections, and policy advocacy on both the national and state levels.</div>
  1026. </div>
  1027. <p>PCUN values the ability for workers to take action against exploitation and all of its effects, and continues to build an agenda that strengthens workers rights by creating safer workplaces, advocating for fair wages, and pushing for enough economic security to care for our families. We also value dignity, and respect for all workers, and the “Sí se puede ” spirit of Dolores Huerta, and Cesar Chavez. PCUN was founded by farmworkers, and today that legacy continues.</p>
  1028. <p>PCUN is focused on building a stronger voice for all Latinx working families in Oregon, from farmworkers to young folks, so that we can collectively improve their well-being and increase prosperity for all.</p>
  1029. <p>The growing power of the Latinx workforce, electorate, and population is integral to both our state’s and the nation’s economy and the future of our civic engagement systems, but because of long-standing inequities, Latinx working families are more often marginalized than they are empowered.</p>
  1030. <p>If we empower and lift up Latinx working families, they will have a stronger voice in the decisions that affect them, and their well being will increase significantly.</p>
  1031. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  1032. <figure>
  1033. <div class="image2-inset">
  1034. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!9yW0!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F28f53db6-a10a-4faa-956b-538f920a3269_298x448.png" alt="" width="287" height="431" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/28f53db6-a10a-4faa-956b-538f920a3269_298x448.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:448,&quot;width&quot;:298,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:243610,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/png&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://paulokirk.substack.com/i/176102934?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F28f53db6-a10a-4faa-956b-538f920a3269_298x448.png&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  1035. <div class="image-link-expand">
  1036. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  1037. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1038. </div>
  1039. </div>
  1040. </div>
  1041. </figure>
  1042. </div>
  1043. <p>NOW, and . . . <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wyY3BpANKKsxEHrRKCA59nmP8GgAbc81/view?usp=drive_link">LISTEN HERE.</a></p>
  1044. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  1045. <figure>
  1046. <div class="image2-inset">
  1047. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="Alexis Guizar-Diaz – TRIO Ronald E. McNair" src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!tciL!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1ccdf8ce-7eb4-4e1e-9438-b08149567c02_480x480.png" alt="Alexis Guizar-Diaz – TRIO Ronald E. McNair" width="414" height="414" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/1ccdf8ce-7eb4-4e1e-9438-b08149567c02_480x480.png&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:480,&quot;width&quot;:480,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;Alexis Guizar-Diaz – TRIO Ronald E. McNair&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
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  1049. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  1050. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1051. </div>
  1052. </div>
  1053. </div>
  1054. </figure>
  1055. </div>
  1056. <p>THEN . . . John Coffee Hays, San Francisco’s first sheriff, had once led deadly Texas Ranger operations against the Comanches and Apaches and campaigns below the Mexican border. In his new job, he organized private volunteers to police California’s frontier that killed yet more Indians.</p>
  1057. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  1058. <figure>
  1059. <div class="image2-inset">
  1060. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="A person with a beard AI-generated content may be incorrect." src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!QUXv!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4f36239a-a093-41d5-8daa-6c0b98aa4ad2_260x352.jpeg" alt="A person with a beard AI-generated content may be incorrect." width="241" height="326" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4f36239a-a093-41d5-8daa-6c0b98aa4ad2_260x352.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:352,&quot;width&quot;:260,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;A person with a beard\n\nAI-generated content may be incorrect.&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  1061. <div class="image-link-expand">
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  1063. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1064. </div>
  1065. </div>
  1066. </div>
  1067. </figure>
  1068. </div>
  1069. <p>And back to NOW . . .</p>
  1070. <div class="captioned-image-container">
  1071. <figure>
  1072. <div class="image2-inset">
  1073. <p><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="sizing-normal aligncenter" title="A group of men in suits AI-generated content may be incorrect." src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Mu5m!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc4495a36-b6f1-4852-ae75-e3851e77531b_955x561.jpeg" alt="A group of men in suits AI-generated content may be incorrect." width="413" height="242" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/c4495a36-b6f1-4852-ae75-e3851e77531b_955x561.jpeg&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:561,&quot;width&quot;:955,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:null,&quot;alt&quot;:&quot;A group of men in suits\n\nAI-generated content may be incorrect.&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:null,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:true,&quot;topImage&quot;:false,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:null,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" /></p>
  1074. <div class="image-link-expand">
  1075. <div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset">
  1076. <div class="pencraft pc-reset icon-container view-image"></div>
  1077. </div>
  1078. </div>
  1079. </div>
  1080. </figure>
  1081. </div>
  1082. </div>
  1083. </div>
  1084. <div class="visibility-check">Comment from a listener/reader: Mike Fish:</div>
  1085. <div>
  1086. <blockquote><p>Another episode of what some would call anti Angloism, and what is actually known as FACT(S).</p>
  1087. <p>How do I, as a so-called white person, with a conscience and a heart, in possession of these FACTS, walk around this defiled land, and not go stark raving mad???</p>
  1088. <p>I try to live by the creed, how would I feel if “that” was done to me, mine, and/or my ancestors???</p>
  1089. <p>People either don’t know, or don’t wanna know.</p>
  1090. <p>Meanwhile, history is being erased and distorted to such a degree, that before long these FACTS will be lost to me, and mine.</p>
  1091. <p>2+2=5</p></blockquote>
  1092. </div>
  1093. </div>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/basta-this-land-is-your-land-hermanos-y-hermanas/">Basta! This Land is YOUR Land, Hermanos y Hermanas</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1097. </item>
  1098. <item>
  1099. <title>Is Capitalism Reaching the End of the Road?</title>
  1100. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/is-capitalism-reaching-the-end-of-the-road/</link>
  1102. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Bill Scheuerman and Sid Plotkin]]></dc:creator>
  1103. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 15:00:39 +0000</pubDate>
  1104. <category><![CDATA[Capitalism]]></category>
  1105. <category><![CDATA[Corporations]]></category>
  1106. <category><![CDATA[Economic Inequality]]></category>
  1107. <category><![CDATA[Labor]]></category>
  1108. <category><![CDATA[Socialism]]></category>
  1109. <category><![CDATA[Unions]]></category>
  1110. <category><![CDATA[Cato Institute]]></category>
  1111. <category><![CDATA[Gallup poll]]></category>
  1112. <category><![CDATA[Gilded Age]]></category>
  1113. <category><![CDATA[Jeff Bezos]]></category>
  1114. <category><![CDATA[Karl Kautsky]]></category>
  1115. <category><![CDATA[Milton Friedman]]></category>
  1116. <category><![CDATA[Zohran Mamdani]]></category>
  1117. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162331</guid>
  1118.  
  1119. <description><![CDATA[<p>Capitalism is fast becoming so unpopular that the money-grubbing old autocrat in the White House wants to protect it by promising to investigate and prosecute anyone who speaks against it. Free speech be damned. But Milton Friedman said Capitalism and Freedom go together.  So, we will use some of that fast-disappearing freedom to comment on the [&#8230;]</p>
  1120. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/is-capitalism-reaching-the-end-of-the-road/">Is Capitalism Reaching the End of the Road?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1121. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p class="western">Capitalism is fast becoming so unpopular that the money-grubbing old autocrat in the White House wants to protect it by promising to investigate and prosecute anyone who speaks against it. Free speech be damned. But Milton Friedman said Capitalism and Freedom go together.  So, we will use some of that fast-disappearing freedom to comment on the fading popularity of “free enterprise”. Capitalism’s legitimacy is sinking so quickly that even the right-wing Cato Institute recently complained that “<a href="https://www.cato.org/blog/young-americans-socialism-too-much-thats-problem-libertarians-must-fix">Young Americans Like Socialism too Much</a>.” This, of course, raises two questions: Just how unpopular is capitalism and, most importantly, why are people turning against it?</p>
  1122. <p class="western">Capitalism has again become so openly exploitative that the old myths of the American Dream and Horatio Alger no longer obscure its cruel reality to more and more Americans. A recent Gallup poll, for example, revealed that only 54% of Americans hold a positive view of capitalism, down from 60% in 2021, and a mere 37% have a favorable attitude toward the corporate sector – the institutional form of capital. Compare this to 2012 when some 58% of Americans favored big business. While Republicans overwhelmingly support capitalism (75%), fewer Independents (51%) and Democrats (42%) view the class structures of capitalism as acceptable. Worse yet for the commanders of capital, 61% of Americans age 18-29 see socialism as a possible alternative. No wonder Socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani is winning big among New York City’s youngest voters. Why not? This is the generation that not only doesn’t expect to do as well as their parents. They really aren’t. College graduate underemployment and frustrated young house buying families suggest a nightmarish awakening from the American Dream. Given the realities of data and denial it’s no wonder that Trump and his right-wing allies are stepping up their war against critics of capital. Once people wake up there’s no telling what they will do. Like today’s youth, they might even take socialism seriously.</p>
  1123. <p class="western">For those shocked at the drop in capitalism’s support, here&#8217;s a basic clue. Capitalist exploitation produces economic inequality. And inequality is not an abstraction: it inflicts real injury and harm to real human beings. It means the vast economic majority of working-class families in America can’t pay rent and food bills, or for clothes for their kids, much less the price of family health insurance, or something as extravagant as a night at the movies. According to The Economic Policy Institute, in 2023 the top 1% of all U.S. income earners, with an average income of just under $800,000, earn about 21% of all income. The top 0.1 % of earners average over $2.8 million. Contrast that to the $58,019 average income earned by the remaining 99%. The same trend holds true when it comes to wealth. Federal Reserve data for 2021 indicate that the top 1% own almost 31% of all wealth, and don’t they love to flaunt it. Think Jeff Bezos and his 400-foot yacht, or Donald Trump and his gold-plated toilet. We’re living in a new “gilded age” for the few and an un-gilded economic cage for the many. The bottom 50% possess next to no wealth at 2.6%. This inequality is not “natural”. It is a symptom of the social class hierarchy and dynamics of capitalism. Capitalism is about partly about surplus value extraction, i.e. paying workers less than the value of what they produce. But it’s also about meeting the financial expectations of financial asset owners. And God-forbid those expectations falter, watch out. As in 2008, the house of financial cards will fall again, and not on the bailed-out bankers, but on the working class. It is important to understand, and more and more people are beginning to, that capitalism is not only unjust and exploitative, it regularly falls apart, leaving in its wake an economic chaos the state cleans up at taxpayer expense. But then, as Thorstein Veblen once observed, what are the taxpayers for?</p>
  1124. <p class="western">The dynamics of partnership between the corporate sector and the political state are a characteristic feature of the system and they reflected in the increasing wage and wealth gap. Consider, for instance, the all-out attack on organized labor waged by corporations with the assistance of government policies: A hostile legal system, outsourcing that contributed to the rise of globalism, and out-and-out union busting have crippled if not destroyed organized labor in the United States. During the 1950’s, union membership peaked at about 33%, today it is barely 10% overall, and only 6% in the private sector. And the number is dropping even more rapidly as Trump terminates the right of hundreds of thousands of federal workers to unionize. The only thing missing from earlier rounds of anti-labor policy are the thousands of injunctions used against strikes in the Gilded Age, but then today there aren’t enough striking workers to enjoin. Labor’s decline is part of a larger dynamic, including concentrated oligopolistic industries that set prices contributing to inflation; government’s toleration of relatively high unemployment levels that keep wages down by creating a reserve army of the unemployed, to use Marx’s term; and tax policies that favor the super-rich and pass costs onto workers by reducing the social safety net. Add to this the reckless behavior of finance capital fueled by greed and the unsustainable manipulation of low-income house buyers that led to the Great Recession, a recession that caused massive unemployment, wiped out the savings of millions of Americans, and stripped many of their homes.  The massive public bailouts of the those responsible for the recession and the public funds that poured into the coffers of the super-rich – and some estimates of the bailout’s cost run north of $13 trillion &#8211; gave new life to the nascent Big Tech industry and their billionaire bosses who now flaunt their wealth amidst growing poverty.</p>
  1125. <p class="western">Today, the Trump administration has taken additional steps to remove the veil that obscures the realities of capitalism and the role the political state plays in promoting it. With a cabinet of billionaires hawking extremist pro-billionaire policies, it’s crystal clear that Karl Kautsky’s old dictum that “the capitalist class rules but does not govern” no longer holds. The billionaire capitalist class always used government to promote their own interests at the expense of the rest of us; now they’ve <i>become</i> the government and people don’t like it. The question is, what comes next? Now that the façade of capitalism is being exposed, will Americans turn to socialism as an alternative? Democratic socialists are gaining support across the nation, with several already in the House of Representatives. And New York City is poised to elect a socialist as mayor. Will Americans follow Trump down his authoritarian road, or will we turn to the model of the Scandinavian countries and build some democratic social control of capital?</p>
  1126. <p class="western">The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/is-capitalism-reaching-the-end-of-the-road/">Is Capitalism Reaching the End of the Road?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1130. </item>
  1131. <item>
  1132. <title>Reclaiming the Sacred in a World of Disparity</title>
  1133. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/reclaiming-the-sacred-in-a-world-of-disparity-2/</link>
  1135. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Sammy Attoh]]></dc:creator>
  1136. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 14:50:31 +0000</pubDate>
  1137. <category><![CDATA[Economic Inequality]]></category>
  1138. <category><![CDATA[Ethics]]></category>
  1139. <category><![CDATA[General]]></category>
  1140. <category><![CDATA[Conscience]]></category>
  1141. <category><![CDATA[faith]]></category>
  1142. <category><![CDATA[humanity]]></category>
  1143. <category><![CDATA[wealthy]]></category>
  1144. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162311</guid>
  1145.  
  1146. <description><![CDATA[<p>In a world where chandeliers glitter above champagne flutes and wealth is paraded as virtue, I ask for a pause. Not to pray—but to reckon. There are over eight billion people on this planet. Each one born into a body, a breath, a need. Not all are born into shelter. Not all are born into [&#8230;]</p>
  1147. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/reclaiming-the-sacred-in-a-world-of-disparity-2/">Reclaiming the Sacred in a World of Disparity</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1148. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>In a world where chandeliers glitter above champagne flutes and wealth is paraded as virtue, I ask for a pause. Not to pray—but to reckon.</p>
  1149. <p>There are over eight billion people on this planet. Each one born into a body, a breath, a need. Not all are born into shelter. Not all are born into safety. But all are born into the same human condition: vulnerability.</p>
  1150. <p>While some exchange gifts wrapped in gold and toast to comfort, others search for clean water. Others sleep on concrete. Others raise children in tents. These are not distant statistics. They are neighbors. They are kin.</p>
  1151. <p>The global economy rewards extraction, not compassion. It praises accumulation, not stewardship. And yet, the peasant farmer—often unseen—tends the soil that feeds us all. The migrant worker builds the towers we inhabit. The caregiver, underpaid and overworked, holds the fragile bodies of our elders.</p>
  1152. <p>Wealth is not distributed by merit. Poverty is not a moral failure. And death, that final equalizer, comes for us all—regardless of status.</p>
  1153. <p>So let us ask: Who benefits from the current order? Who is left behind? And what kind of world are we building when justice is gated and dignity is rationed?</p>
  1154. <p>This is not a call to faith. It is a call to conscience. Whether one believes in divine creation or not, the ethical imperative remains: no human being should be discarded.</p>
  1155. <p>Before the music plays. Before the glasses clink. Let us remember: some have no home. Some have no water. Some have no shield against the cold.</p>
  1156. <p>We are our brother’s keeper—not by charity, but by shared humanity. The measure of a society is not in its wealth, but in how it treats the forgotten.</p>
  1157. <p>Let us listen. Let us act. Let us build a world where dignity is not a privilege—but a birthright.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/reclaiming-the-sacred-in-a-world-of-disparity-2/">Reclaiming the Sacred in a World of Disparity</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1161. </item>
  1162. <item>
  1163. <title>The Bogus Value of the Pentagon Press Pass</title>
  1164. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-bogus-value-of-the-pentagon-press-pass/</link>
  1166. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Binoy Kampmark]]></dc:creator>
  1167. <pubDate>Thu, 16 Oct 2025 08:02:29 +0000</pubDate>
  1168. <category><![CDATA[Censorship]]></category>
  1169. <category><![CDATA[Journalism]]></category>
  1170. <category><![CDATA[Julian Assange]]></category>
  1171. <category><![CDATA[The Pentagon]]></category>
  1172. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  1173. <category><![CDATA["National Security"]]></category>
  1174. <category><![CDATA[First Amendment.]]></category>
  1175. <category><![CDATA[Fourth Estate]]></category>
  1176. <category><![CDATA[Patrick Cockburn]]></category>
  1177. <category><![CDATA[Peter Hegseth]]></category>
  1178. <category><![CDATA[Tom Bowman]]></category>
  1179. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162336</guid>
  1180.  
  1181. <description><![CDATA[<p>Reporting on national security matters, irrespective of which country you are in, can be a hazardous affair. In police states, the consequences are self-evident to the brave who report on their misdeeds. The paid off toadies do not count. In liberal democracies, there are also consequences for giving the game away on the national security [&#8230;]</p>
  1182. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-bogus-value-of-the-pentagon-press-pass/">The Bogus Value of the Pentagon Press Pass</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1183. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Reporting on national security matters, irrespective of which country you are in, can be a hazardous affair. In police states, the consequences are self-evident to the brave who report on their misdeeds. The paid off toadies do not count. In liberal democracies, there are also consequences for giving the game away on the national security state. The toadies, in that case, pose themselves as insiders rather than sycophants of moulded consensus. They are the blessed recipients of approved wisdom, officially or otherwise. In this cosmos of regulation, even those who disagree with official policies can be given a gentle airing. </p>
  1184. <p>This is particularly so in the United States. Go through the media stable of any US broadcasting network or major paper, and you find them, many former apparatchiks of the imperium’s various agencies, tugging their forelocks to empire. As Julian Assange found to his personal cost, to give the game away by publishing the national security material of Freedom’s Land is to invite prosecution and conviction under the Espionage Act of 1917, despite having never set foot in the country, let alone having US nationality.</p>
  1185. <p>It was therefore a rare event to see press outlets get stroppy in unison to proposals by the US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that reporters agree to a new policy on reporting material from the department. In a <u><a class="western" href="https://www.npr.org/2025/09/20/g-s1-89713/pentagon-new-strict-guidelines-for-media">document</a></u> boasting the Pentagon’s new name of “Department of War”, journalists are informed that “DoW information must be approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released, even if it is unclassified.” Those reporting outside approved channels could be designated “a security or safety risk” and have their credentials withdrawn.</p>
  1186. <p>While policy acknowledges that journalists receiving and publishing unsolicited classified or sensitive information from government sources are “generally” protected by First Amendment freedoms, it takes issue with soliciting “the disclosure of such information” or encouraging Pentagon staff “to violate laws and policies concerning the disclosure of such information”.</p>
  1187. <p>In a post on X, Hegseth <u><a class="western" href="https://x.com/PeteHegseth/status/1977828217315549301">called</a></u> access to the Pentagon “a privilege, not a right.” It is certainly a privilege he has been trying to trim, having implemented rules earlier this year limiting the movements of reporters through the Pentagon without approved escorts. In September, he issued a tart <u><a class="western" href="https://x.com/PeteHegseth/status/1969179306648613129">reminder</a></u> that press members were “no longer allowed to roam the halls of a secure facility. Wear a badge and follow the rules – or go home.”</p>
  1188. <p><i>The Washington Post</i>’s executive editor Matt Murray <u><a class="western" href="https://www.axios.com/2025/10/14/pentagon-press-restrictions-trump-journalists-news-outlets">is of the view</a></u> that the proposed policy undercuts the protections guaranteed by the First Amendment “by placing unnecessary constraints on gathering and publishing information.” Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of <i>The Atlantic</i>, <u><a class="western" href="https://www.axios.com/2025/10/14/pentagon-press-restrictions-trump-journalists-news-outlets">stated</a></u> his magazine’s opposition to the restrictions. “The requirements violate our First Amendment rights, and the rights of Americans who seek to know how taxpayer funded military resources and personnel are being deployed.” In his <u><a class="western" href="https://www.press.org/newsroom/national-press-club-statement-pentagon-restrictions-threaten-independent-reporting">statement</a></u>, National Press Club President Mike Balsamo thought Hegseth’s latest measure “a direct assault on independent journalism at the very place where independent scrutiny matters most: the US military.”</p>
  1189. <p>Each of the major broadcast networks <u><a class="western" href="https://thehill.com/policy/defense/5555797-media-outlets-decline-pentagon-policy/">issued a joint statement</a></u> on October 14 saying they would refuse to subscribe to the policy. “Today, we join virtually every other news organization in declining to agree to the Pentagon’s new requirements, which would restrict journalists’ ability to keep the nation and the world informed of important national security issues.” This was a dictate “without precedent and threatens core journalistic protections.”</p>
  1190. <p>While the policy speaks to President Donald Trump’s ongoing mania with limiting the access of Fourth Estate outlets he dislikes, the question not being asked is how useful the Pentagon press ever was to begin with. Does having a pass to the mandarins of military power really ensure accuracy, let alone accountability, in terms of reporting? Or are such passes of greater benefit to those who grant them in the first place? Press conferences and meetings speak to management, control of the narrative, and reining in tales of misadventure. Interrogating foolish policies, misspending and acts of imperial mischief are rarely the preserve of the mainstream stable. They publish on the herd-like assumption that nothing they write will warrant exclusion from the club. Doing so also preserves conscience and cowardice, both being, as Oscar Wilde <u><a class="western" href="https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/174">thought</a></u>, much the same thing. (Conscience, he goes on to say in <i>The Picture of Dorian Gray</i>, is merely “the trade-name of the firm.”) </p>
  1191. <p>Lethal to the craft is the dual policy of keeping members of the Fourth Estate in the officers’ orbit when in Washington and embedding them with combat troops when overseas, an approach that has sterilised the prospects of steely, valuable reporting. The effectiveness of this move by the Pentagon is evident in the view of NPR’s Tom Bowman, <u><a class="western" href="https://www.npr.org/2025/10/14/g-s1-93297/pentagon-reporter-opinion-press-policy">who mourns</a></u> the loss of a Pentagon pass he has held for 28 years. “For most of that time, when I wasn’t overseas in combat zones embedding with troops, I walked the halls, talking to and getting to know the officers from all over the globe, at times visiting them in their offices.”</p>
  1192. <p>Bowman shows no awareness that proximity to power, much like holding it, corrupts. His Pentagon years were marked by “finding out what’s really going on behind the scenes and not accepting wholesale what any government or administration says.” There is never that inkling of doubt whether such behind-the-scenes discoveries were <i>intended</i>. He recalls running “into an officer” in the department who revealed that the fall of Baghdad to US-led forces in 2003 was not an evident sign of decisive success. This less than revelatory account is not a patch on any of the magisterial reports from coal face scribblers such as Patrick Cockburn, who made a point very early on of mastering Middle Eastern affairs by actually being there. He could tell long before any bloodhound in the Pentagon could that Washington’s foolish and destructive presence in Mesopotamia was doomed to failure and lasting consequences. </p>
  1193. <p>Perhaps now, with their cherished passes surrendered or revoked, the moaning establishment hacks might finally get some decent reporting done on the national security state in all its wondrous, spanning ghastliness. Hegseth may well have done them an enormous favour while scuttling an important platform of influence.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-bogus-value-of-the-pentagon-press-pass/">The Bogus Value of the Pentagon Press Pass</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1197. </item>
  1198. <item>
  1199. <title>The Ancient History of Socialism in North America</title>
  1200. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-ancient-history-of-socialism-in-north-america/</link>
  1202. <dc:creator><![CDATA[David Swanson]]></dc:creator>
  1203. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 15:04:00 +0000</pubDate>
  1204. <category><![CDATA[Economic Inequality]]></category>
  1205. <category><![CDATA[Europe]]></category>
  1206. <category><![CDATA[Freedom]]></category>
  1207. <category><![CDATA[History]]></category>
  1208. <category><![CDATA[Original Peoples]]></category>
  1209. <category><![CDATA[Socialism]]></category>
  1210. <category><![CDATA[Turtle Island]]></category>
  1211. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162307</guid>
  1212.  
  1213. <description><![CDATA[<p>Monday was Indigenous People’s Day, when much of the United States celebrates a murdering, enslaving, profiteering, imperialist Italian sailor mercenary and missionary who couldn’t tell one continent from another, wisdom from ignorance, or value from waste. I was born and raised and have mostly lived in the eastern United States, and yet when I hear [&#8230;]</p>
  1214. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-ancient-history-of-socialism-in-north-america/">The Ancient History of Socialism in North America</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1215. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Monday was Indigenous People’s Day, when much of the United States celebrates a murdering, enslaving, profiteering, imperialist Italian sailor mercenary and missionary who couldn’t tell one continent from another, wisdom from ignorance, or value from waste.</p>
  1216. <p>I was born and raised and have mostly lived in the eastern United States, and yet when I hear someone here refer to “how people lived several hundred years ago,” they almost always mean how people lived in Europe several hundred years ago. I see great value in studying European history and that of the whole globe. But I have no particular connection to or heritage from medieval Europe to the exclusion of connection with the people who lived on the same land I do.</p>
  1217. <p>Apart from the staggeringly stupid factors of what color my skin is or who my particular great-great-great-great grandparents were, there is simply no reason for me to talk about human history as flowing back through time to British colonists, and then back across the ocean on their ships, and then back through Europe to the days of Neanderthals. Most of human history has happened nowhere near where I live at all. But the people for whom many of the locations around me are named, the people whose paths became the roads I walk and drive on, the people who developed much of the knowledge of local plants and animals where I live, the people whose descendants’ oral histories have outlasted the plowing under of the mounds — they were people I think we still have much to learn from.</p>
  1218. <p>About a thousand years ago, as the world warmed, some of the peoples of North America chose to develop far greater surpluses of agriculture, far larger cities and pyramids, and — to varying degrees in some of those same places — far more hierarchical and unequal and violent societies. When the world began cooling, some 750 years ago, a trend developed of moving to less hierarchical societies, of living in smaller cities and towns. The largest cities we know of in places we now call Arizona, Illinois, and Alabama were abandoned by 1400. Columbus would not be born for over 50 years when Turtle Island was going through a democratic revolution.</p>
  1219. <p>In the past 200 years or so (though much less in the last 50), great effort has gone into pretending that the Indigenous peoples of North America were too simplistic to have ever built cities. The fact that they had built cities that rivaled the world’s greatest cities at the time does not address the most egregious lie here. The worst lie here is that living without major cities or monuments is simplistic, or that it hadn’t been chosen by people who had learned that oligarchy was not what they wanted. This is a bias that plagues history and archaeology worldwide, of course, as focus is easily drawn to what actually exists in physical remains, which tends to be the monuments and writings of kings and emperors and their Marco Rubios.</p>
  1220. <p>There was nothing simplistic about moving — in many ways back to earlier traditions — to a system of governance not imposed by a small elite so much as participated in by an engaged population in which all were expected to fulfill responsibilities and to reach a consensus on decisions. Just as carefully maintained woods and groves cannot be dismissed as simplistic gathering or hunting in the wilderness, just as sustainable three-sisters agriculture cannot be scorned for its failure to destroy the soil, and just as a way of life cannot be rejected as savage by a society whose members tended to prefer joining it when given the chance, so more democratic governance cannot be taken as a sign of inferiority at the same time that we champion either (depending on political party) roving bands of masked thugs kidnapping people or a veneer of elections overlaid on oligarchy as the height of civilization.</p>
  1221. <p>The Bill of Rights that is being shredded, and the European Enlightenment that is apparently regretted in many quarters, owe a great deal to the Indigenous people of North America. Europeans learned about Native Americans through European colonies, including through debates and discussions with them, written works and exchanges, and public and private seminars, both in the Americas and in Europe. The Indigenous critique of European society included its lack of freedom, equality, or fraternity, its shocking willingness to leave people poor and suffering, and its obsession with wealth at the expense of time and leisure. This critique was the origin of a great strain of thought in the European Enlightenment, to which a major response was the Rousseau-Hobbesian infantilization of the people who had just made a wise, coherent, and articulate critique, as well as the invention of false claims of the necessity to sacrifice freedom for safety, of the supposed decrease rather than increase in hours worked in shifting to a European way of life, etc.</p>
  1222. <p>Prior to the critique made by the residents of Turtle Island, European intellectuals didn’t bother to make excuses for inequality as an inevitable sign of progress, because the notion that there was anything wrong with inequality hadn’t much occurred to them. Many of the societies that were savagely attacked in the creation of the United States were mutually recognized by both themselves and Europeans as free in comparison with Europe and its colonies, the only dispute being whether freedom was a good thing or not. Today, the Native Americans have basically won the rhetorical debate, while the Europeans have won the lived reality. Everybody loves freedom; few have it. Although if you utter the phrase “defund the police” you may discover vibrant remnants of those Jesuits who admitted that Wendat people had much less conflict than existed in France despite having to obey no laws — and yet denounced that success, as a matter of principle.</p>
  1223. <p>Horrified as many of us may be today of a candidate for Mayor of New York City proposing to make buses free or housing affordable, the practice of maintaining rough equality of wealth in societies of significant size has a much longer history on the land we stand on than we usually bear in mind. The people who lived on this land didn’t suffer a “collapse” of civilization, but chose to not trust oligarchs, overlords, and powerful priests. They chose to replace palaces with meeting houses and public squares. They chose to create roles, structures, ceremonies, and practices that would allow people to govern themselves. This was not without deep flaws, and it was done in a very different world from ours, but it was thoroughly and effectively done. A culture was developed in which prestige came from sharing rather than from hoarding.</p>
  1224. <p>Montaigne recounted a conversation in France between a number of Native Americans and King Charles IX, in which they said, perhaps to his discomfort, “that they had observed that there were amongst us men full and crammed with all manner of commodities, whilst, in the meantime, their [fellows] were begging at their doors, lean and half-starved with hunger and poverty; and they thought it strange that these necessitous [ones] were able to suffer so great an inequality and injustice, and that they did not take the others by the throats, or set fire to their houses.” This was over 200 years before the French revolution.</p>
  1225. <ul>
  1226. <li>First published at <a href="https://progressivehub.net/the-ancient-history-of-socialism-in-north-america/"><em>Progressive Hub</em></a>.</li>
  1227. </ul>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-ancient-history-of-socialism-in-north-america/">The Ancient History of Socialism in North America</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1231. </item>
  1232. <item>
  1233. <title>Imperial Double Standards: Warfare for Venezuela and Welfare for Argentina</title>
  1234. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/imperial-double-standards-warfare-for-venezuela-and-welfare-for-argentina/</link>
  1236. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Francisco Dominguez, Roger D. Harris, and John Perry]]></dc:creator>
  1237. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 15:00:24 +0000</pubDate>
  1238. <category><![CDATA[Argentina]]></category>
  1239. <category><![CDATA[Corruption]]></category>
  1240. <category><![CDATA[Currency]]></category>
  1241. <category><![CDATA[Debt]]></category>
  1242. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  1243. <category><![CDATA[Economy/Economics]]></category>
  1244. <category><![CDATA[Finance]]></category>
  1245. <category><![CDATA[IMF]]></category>
  1246. <category><![CDATA[Imperialism]]></category>
  1247. <category><![CDATA[Javier Milei]]></category>
  1248. <category><![CDATA[Militarism]]></category>
  1249. <category><![CDATA[Neoliberalism]]></category>
  1250. <category><![CDATA[Nicolas Maduro]]></category>
  1251. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  1252. <category><![CDATA[Venezuela]]></category>
  1253. <category><![CDATA[Anarcho-Capitalism]]></category>
  1254. <category><![CDATA[Chavisimo]]></category>
  1255. <category><![CDATA[narco-capitalist]]></category>
  1256. <category><![CDATA[Pete Hegseth]]></category>
  1257. <category><![CDATA[Scott Bessent]]></category>
  1258. <category><![CDATA[Zone of Peace]]></category>
  1259. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162293</guid>
  1260.  
  1261. <description><![CDATA[<p>Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution has been in the vanguard of the Global South. In contrast, President Javiar Milei’s government in Argentina represents the logical, though absurd, consequence of extreme neoliberalism, which he calls “anarcho-capitalism.” Western Hemispheric geopolitics reflect the weakening of US hegemony and an emerging multipolarity, especially with China’s entry as a major regional trading [&#8230;]</p>
  1262. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/imperial-double-standards-warfare-for-venezuela-and-welfare-for-argentina/">Imperial Double Standards: Warfare for Venezuela and Welfare for Argentina</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1263. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution has been in the vanguard of the Global South. In contrast, President Javiar Milei’s government in Argentina represents the logical, though absurd, consequence of extreme neoliberalism, which he calls “anarcho-capitalism.” </p>
  1264. <p>Western Hemispheric geopolitics reflect the weakening of US hegemony and an emerging multipolarity, especially with China’s entry as a major regional trading partner. US imperialism’s response, started well before Trump, has been to weaponize the dollar, impose illegal and crippling economic sanctions, and levy arbitrary tariffs. When these fail, the recourse is to military aggression. </p>
  1265. <p>US War Secretary Pete Hegseth announced <u><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/06/06/preparing-war-china-threat-us-defense-secretary-pete-hegseth/">preparations</a></u> for war with China. Washington has concluded that it must put a halt to multipolarity to maintain its global supremacy. Thus, the Trump administration is simultaneously rushing to rescue Milei’s government while hurrying to overturn Venezuela’s under their President Nicolás Maduro. </p>
  1266. <p><b>Role of Venezuela under Chavismo</b></p>
  1267. <p>Venezuela is a beacon of national sovereignty and social progress. It has consistently opposed imperialist aggression, not just in Latin America, but globally. Under the movement known as “Chavismo” it aimed for Latin American integration and the pooling of its huge natural resources, offering an independent pathway to development to withstand US imperialism. </p>
  1268. <p>Consequently, it has been under attack, enduring US-financed far-right violence, destabilization, a US-led asphyxiating economic blockade, assassination attempts on the president and leading Bolivarian officials, mercenary attacks, coups and terrorism – the full arsenal of Washington’s aggressive toolkit.</p>
  1269. <p><b>Role of Argentina under Milei</b></p>
  1270. <p>In 2023, anti-establishment anger propelled libertarian populist Javier Milei to the Argentine presidency. His Trump-like “chainsaw plan” – radical spending cuts and a war on government institutions and services – fitted with the orthodoxy dictated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Milei <u><a href="https://www.perfil.com/noticias/politica/un-ano-de-javier-milei-cuantos-ministerios-se-cerraron-durante-su-gestion.phtml">closed</a></u> 13 government ministries, including those for education, labor and social security. Foreign lenders welcomed Milei’s elevation of austerity to a moral imperative.</p>
  1271. <p>Milei is still <u><a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2025/08/01/Argentina-First-Review-Under-the-Extended-Arrangement-Under-the-Extended-Fund-Facility-569162">favored by the IMF</a></u>. But while his unwillingness to devalue the peso helped cut inflation, it slowed economic growth and reduced the country’s capacity to sustain its huge debt. Argentina is now over <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/CR/Issues/2025/08/01/Argentina-First-Review-Under-the-Extended-Arrangement-Under-the-Extended-Fund-Facility-569162"><u>$450 bn</u></a> in the red. Employment <u><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/02/28/javier-milei-argentina-economy-resource-colony/">fell steeply</a></u>, while poverty <u><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ceqn751x19no">soared</a></u> to affect 53% of the population in 2024 (allegedly reducing since then). Budget cuts raised the cost of basic needs. </p>
  1272. <p>Corruption scandals emerged. A close political associate of Milei <u><a href="https://batimes.com.ar/news/argentina/espert-confirms-link-to-machado-but-says-us200k-wasnt-from-him.phtml">admitted</a></u> receiving “donations” from a narco-entrepreneur. A US$4.6 bn crypto scandal followed; the largest ever <u><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2025/02/24/argentinas-46-billion-crypto-scandal-largest-ever-crypto-theft/">crypto-theft</a></u><i>. </i>Milei’s left opposition demanded his impeachment, and a judge launched a fraud probe. Later, <u><a href="https://www.france24.com/en/americas/20250829-corruption-scandal-threatens-argentina-s-right-wing-president-milei-and-his-influential-sister">Milei’s sister</a></u> was accused of receiving hefty bribes. On top of this came the crushing defeat for Milei’s libertarian party in the Buenos Aires provincial elections in September. </p>
  1273. <p>All that has triggered a run on the peso and a new economic crisis.</p>
  1274. <p>Trump’s recent decision to bail out Milei’s predictably disastrous economic performance is consistent with the profligacy of IMF-US lending to right-wing Argentine governments. In April 2025, the <i>Buenos Aires Times</i> <u><a href="https://batimes.com.ar/news/economy/argentina-and-the-international-monetary-fund-a-long-tricky-history.phtml">reported</a></u> that the IMF praised Milei’s efforts and projected that the Argentine economy would grow faster than the global average. In fact, Milei tipped the country into recession and sent millions of people into poverty in the first months of his government.</p>
  1275. <p>In short, Milei’s “narco-capitalist” government is not only corrupt but has savaged Argentina’s economy. Milei represents the logical culmination of Argentina’s ruling class servitude to US geopolitical objectives, even extending to his enthusiastic support for genocide in Gaza. Slavishly supporting anything Trump does or says, Argentina was <u><a href="https://buenosairesherald.com/world/international-relations/argentina-one-of-10-countries-to-vote-against-un-two-state-solution-for-israel-palestine">one of only ten countries</a></u> to vote with the US against the UN’s two-state solution for Israel-Palestine. </p>
  1276. <p><b>IMF wages financial war against Venezuela</b></p>
  1277. <p>The IMF is a key institution through which the US enforces its imperial dominance, part of an architecture shaped largely by Washington. Often functioning as a financial arm of US foreign policy, it rewards compliant right-wing regimes such as those of Argentine presidents Macri and Milei, while punishing independent governments like Venezuela’s that are striving for socialism. </p>
  1278. <p>An example is the IMF response to the 2002 coup against Venezuela’s democratically elected President Hugo Chávez. The IMF publicly stated its readiness to collaborate with coup-monger Pedro Carmona, whose “government” abolished the constitution and key democratic institutions. Within hours after Chávez was kidnapped, the IMF’s Thomas Dawson <u><a href="https://www.imf.org/en/News/Articles/2015/09/28/04/54/tr020412">said</a></u>: “we stand ready to assist the new administration in whatever manner they find suitable.” Fortunately for democracy, the coup lasted only 47 hours. The people spontaneously rose up and returned their rightful president to his office. </p>
  1279. <p>More recently, during the Covid-19 crisis, IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva announced an emergency response which could disburse US$50 bn to developing countries and US$10 bn to low-income countries at a zero-interest rate. Venezuela had tried to exercise its “special drawing rights” for US$5 bn to combat the pandemic. This required IMF officials to <u><a href="https://peoplesdispatch.org/2020/03/19/imf-refuses-aid-to-venezuela-in-the-midst-of-the-coronavirus-crisis/">engage in acrobatics</a></u> to justify rejecting Venezuela’s request. The real reason was the US government’s farcical recognition of Juan Guaidó as “interim president.” </p>
  1280. <p><b>US-IMF props up rightist Argentina</b></p>
  1281. <p>In 1999-2002, when Argentina had a right-wing government, the IMF <u><a href="https://cepr.net/publications/political-forecasting-the-imfs-flawed-growth-projections-for-argentina-and-venezuela/">overestimated</a></u> GDP growth. Then, conversely, in 2003-2015 when Argentina had left-wing governments under the Kirchners, the IMF underestimated the strength of the country’s economic recovery. IMF debt was paid off, Argentina’s notorious external debt <u><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/03/10/javier-milei-argentina-imf-debt-trap-loan/">fell sharply</a></u>, no new IMF loans were granted. </p>
  1282. <p>But for the past decade, its politics have revolved around chronic economic crises and persistent IMF influence. Across three presidencies, Argentina swung from market liberalization (Macri, who succeeded the Kirchners), to state intervention (Fernández), to radical austerity (Milei). Right-wing Mauricio Macri acquired a US$57 bn loan, <u><a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/imf-throws-argentina-a-57-billion-lifeline/">the largest</a></u> in the fund’s history. The IMF itself <u><a href="https://www.dandc.eu/en/article/imf-made-many-mistakes-its-57-billion-loan-programme-argentina-here-are-some-lessons">admitted</a></u> the bailout “was not fit for purpose.” The country is now on its twenty-third IMF bailout, a <a href="https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2025/09/22/argentinas-finances-just-got-even-more-surreal"><u>global record</u></a>. It is the fund’s biggest debtor, owing a <a href="https://apnews.com/article/trump-bessent-argentina-milei-currency-swap-7432a188e57264f0e5f6c753ddc40879"><u>“staggering”</u></a> $41.8 bn. </p>
  1283. <p><b>US aggression against Venezuela</b></p>
  1284. <p>The US finds it intolerable that Venezuela – a “threat” of a good example – has successfully resisted US policy of “maximum pressure.” Its military build-up against Venezuela is an escalation from hybrid to open warfare aimed at suppressing an alternative model of sovereignty and social justice, with the possible bonus of reclaiming control over the country’s oil resources.</p>
  1285. <p>Trump has deployed a fleet of warships, F-35 stealth fighter jets, and several thousand marines. Washington is <u><a href="https://www.wlrn.org/americas/2025-09-22/u-s-military-buildup-in-caribbean-signals-broader-campaign-against-venezuela">positioning</a></u> military forces in Puerto Rico, has a substantial military presence in Guyana, and asked Grenada to deploy US military forces in its territory. Trump has declared the US to be at war with drug cartels, potentially extending to those supposedly inside Venezuela itself. <u><a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/opinion/will-the-us-attack-venezuela/">Commentators</a></u>, including officials of the Bolivarian government, conclude that a US military strike seems imminent. </p>
  1286. <p>Washington’s justification is a <u><a href="https://original.antiwar.com/roger_harris/2025/10/07/bringing-a-howitzer-to-a-knife-fight-us-armada-off-venezuela/">monumental lie</a></u>: Venezuela is alleged to be a narco state, led by the non-existent Cartel de los Soles. Rubio and Trump falsely accuse the Bolivarian government of shipping hundreds of tons of drugs into the US. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has <u><a href="https://www.unodc.org/unodc/data-and-analysis/world-drug-report-2025.html">consistently reported</a></u> that up to 92 percent of the cocaine produced in Colombia and Ecuador reaches the US through the Pacific (Venezuela’s entire coastline faces the Caribbean Sea).</p>
  1287. <p><b>Trump and Milei</b></p>
  1288. <p>In sharp contrast to the economic punishment being meted out to Venezuela, Trump’s “<u><a href="https://x.com/madorni/status/1856366792223965424">favorite president</a></u>” is getting a bailout for the economy he that has destroyed. Milei is promised a direct purchase of pesos with dollars, together with a $20 bn central bank “swap line.” Milei swiftly <u><a href="https://www.batimes.com.ar/news/economy/united-states-buys-pesos-confirms-us20-billion-lifeline-for-milei-and-argentina.phtml">thanked Trump</a></u> for his “vision and powerful leadership.” </p>
  1289. <p>Washington openly admits its ideological motives. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US should <a href="https://www.infobae.com/economia/2025/09/22/el-secretario-del-tesoro-dijo-que-la-asistencia-de-eeuu-para-la-argentina-sera-grande-y-contundente/"><u>help conservatives win elections</u></a> in Latin America. He <a href="https://x.com/SecScottBessent/status/1976358303098662932"><u>tweeted</u></a>: “The success of Argentina’s reform agenda is…in the strategic interest of the United States.” Praising Argentina’s “strong and stable” economy, he failed to address why it would collapse without US support. </p>
  1290. <p>The bailout appears to have several undeclared aims. One, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/09/us/politics/argentina-bailout-investors.html"><u>according to</u></a> the <i>New York Times,</i> is to help rich investors whose bets could falter if Argentina’s economy sinks. The same source claims that US officials are also pushing Argentina to scale back its ties with China and want access to its uranium and lithium supplies. The rescue plan may even involve <a href="https://fortune.com/2025/10/08/inside-the-trump-teams-secret-talks-to-rescue-argentina-with-the-help-of-the-money-doctor-who-wants-to-stop-the-pink-tide-sweeping-latin-america/"><u>dollarizing</u></a> Argentina’s economy. </p>
  1291. <p>Nearly half of Argentinians (44%) <a href="https://www.batimes.com.ar/news/economy/trump-lifeline-does-little-to-boost-milei-with-voters-in-argentina.phtml"><u>see the deal</u></a> as more likely to benefit the US than their own nation, while 36% have a negative view of Milei’s relationship with Washington. The irony of Trump’s economic lifeline for Milei is that it may kill off his chances of political survival.</p>
  1292. <p><b>Neoliberal misery vs multipolar-oriented sovereign development</b></p>
  1293. <p>Bolivarian Venezuela and Milei’s Argentina present two starkly different paths for Latin America—Venezuela’s sovereign defiance of US imperialism and Argentina’s deepening subservience and dependency. One suffers imperial “hybrid warfare” while the other gains imperial “welfare.” </p>
  1294. <p>Washington uses coercive tools—sanctions, economic warfare, and military threats—to preserve hemispheric dominance. Venezuela embodies resistance and regional integration. Argentina, under Milei, epitomizes the collapse into “narco-capitalism,” social devastation, and foreign subjection. </p>
  1295. <p>Ultimately, neoliberal austerity brings only poverty and dependency, while multipolar cooperation among Global South nations offers a viable path toward genuine independence, equitable development and resistance to imperial domination. US military actions against Venezuela violate international law and rest on unfounded claims. Latin America is a declared <u><a href="https://www.wpc-in.org/news/celac-declare-zone-peace">Zone of Peace</a></u>. To respect that and allow the people their right to live without fear of war, the US must withdraw its forces.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/imperial-double-standards-warfare-for-venezuela-and-welfare-for-argentina/">Imperial Double Standards: Warfare for Venezuela and Welfare for Argentina</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1299. </item>
  1300. <item>
  1301. <title>The Chips are Down</title>
  1302. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-chips-are-down/</link>
  1304. <dc:creator><![CDATA[J.S. O’Keefe]]></dc:creator>
  1305. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 14:58:06 +0000</pubDate>
  1306. <category><![CDATA[Beliefs]]></category>
  1307. <category><![CDATA[Fiction]]></category>
  1308. <category><![CDATA[Celts]]></category>
  1309. <category><![CDATA[clergyman]]></category>
  1310. <category><![CDATA[pagans]]></category>
  1311. <category><![CDATA[Satan]]></category>
  1312. <category><![CDATA[wisdom]]></category>
  1313. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162313</guid>
  1314.  
  1315. <description><![CDATA[<p>“Now is not the accepted time to make new enemies,” said the philosopher on his death bed, responding to the priest’s exhortation to renounce Satan. “Why the intransigence?” marveled the young clergyman. “Frankly, sir, I cannot imagine there could be a downside to rejecting the devil.” “Just you ponder that question, padre,” said the wise [&#8230;]</p>
  1316. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-chips-are-down/">The Chips are Down</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1317. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>“Now is not the accepted time to make new enemies,” said the philosopher on his death bed, responding to the priest’s exhortation to renounce Satan.</p>
  1318. <p>“Why the intransigence?” marveled the young clergyman. “Frankly, sir, I cannot imagine there could be a downside to rejecting the devil.”</p>
  1319. <p>“Just you ponder that question, padre,” said the wise man. “You seem an intelligent person, I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”</p>
  1320. <p>A month later when the plague hit most of Europe and the priest started developing chills and fever, he conceded that on purely practical grounds the old knucklehead might have had a point.</p>
  1321. <p>He also decided, if he survived this perilous ordeal, he’d write an essay on the conflict between official wisdom and common-sense practicality, without delineating the religious aspects of his own experience.</p>
  1322. <p>After recovering, the good pastor did pen the piece, embellishing it enough to be a pamphlet. Next, under his obsessive writing hand the pamphlet grew into a full novel, a bestseller with an overarching theme of the wicker-man rituals of ancient Celts.</p>
  1323. <p>As a result, quiet a few well-read people blame all of humanity’s ills on the pagans.</p>
  1324. <ul>
  1325. <li>A sketch of this article was published in <em>Friday Flash Fiction</em>, October 10, 2025.</li>
  1326. </ul>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/the-chips-are-down/">The Chips are Down</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1330. </item>
  1331. <item>
  1332. <title>Academic Integrity in the Age of AI</title>
  1333. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/academic-integrity-in-the-age-of-ai/</link>
  1335. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Prabhav Khandelwal]]></dc:creator>
  1336. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 14:53:34 +0000</pubDate>
  1337. <category><![CDATA[Academia]]></category>
  1338. <category><![CDATA[Artificial Intelligence (AI)]]></category>
  1339. <category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
  1340. <category><![CDATA[Students]]></category>
  1341. <category><![CDATA[ChatGPT]]></category>
  1342. <category><![CDATA[Copilot]]></category>
  1343. <category><![CDATA[ENAI]]></category>
  1344. <category><![CDATA[European Network for Academic Integrity]]></category>
  1345. <category><![CDATA[Gemini]]></category>
  1346. <category><![CDATA[integrity]]></category>
  1347. <category><![CDATA[UNESCO]]></category>
  1348. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162288</guid>
  1349.  
  1350. <description><![CDATA[<p>AI has been the buzzword for quite some time in the 21st century. With the advent of AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot, day-to-day tasks have become significantly easier. Gone are the tough times of hustle and bustle, brainstorming over one thing again and again. With a single click of a strong prompt command, [&#8230;]</p>
  1351. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/academic-integrity-in-the-age-of-ai/">Academic Integrity in the Age of AI</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1352. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/AI.avif"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-162290" src="https://dissidentvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/AI-300x300.avif" alt="" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://dissidentvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/AI-300x300.avif 300w, https://dissidentvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/AI-150x150.avif 150w, https://dissidentvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/AI.avif 740w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /></a>AI has been the buzzword for quite some time in the 21st century. With the advent of AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot, day-to-day tasks have become significantly easier. Gone are the tough times of hustle and bustle, brainstorming over one thing again and again. With a single click of a strong prompt command, the AI tool flashes a variety of suggestions and solutions. Apart from its imperative benefits, the core nature of artificial intelligence is a double-edged sword that cannot be ignored. Overdependence on AI often dilutes the fundamental fact that its wit is, after all, ARTIFICIAL! The intellectual integrity of AI tools is designed to imitate, react, and respond like a human, and are accordingly programmed. Though it polishes ideas well, that is exactly the point where the dilemma lies. Genuineness and true academic integrity, along with the frowned-upon ironic element of plagiarism, clash. Is this the very debate that disturbs the user, a man, or merely a simple software? In this AI bubble, dynamics kick in hard like a perpetual peril.</p>
  1353. <p>Academic integrity and AI are two sides of the same coin. They share an everlasting, enigmatic struggle. It overlooks the moral values that man judges, what’s right and what&#8217;s wrong, not the machine. The code of conduct upholds character. Ethics such as honesty, fairness, trust, and respect all lie in the hands of humans sustained. Education and its authentic assessment highly reflect this.</p>
  1354. <p>In the digital age, AI has also transformed the landscape of edtech, profoundly challenging the integrity of one-on-one learning. Surveys have shown a jump in cheating cases. Globally, more than 50% of students and educators use AI tools for homework and grading purposes. In the education ecosystem, educators and students alike must urgently work to ensure accuracy, avoid bias, and safeguard originality and critical thinking. Education must remain a transparent exchange of information between human teachers and genuine learners looking to gain practical knowledge. Although complex, it is key to embrace serious R&amp;D in structural pedagogy. This will ensure integrity from the bare roots.</p>
  1355. <p>Ironically, where institutions introduce AI detection tools, students defend them as marked under ‘productivity’. The <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291125000269">European Network for Academic Integrity (ENAI)</a> and UNESCO have developed AI governance guidelines to foster AI literacy, highlighting problems and solutions. Ultimately, the reality still lies beyond the eyes, where the ethical use of AI in education often fails miserably rather than shaping it. The misuse leverages far more than the use. It resonates beyond any external tools or resources. Strong AI policies acknowledging the use and need must be formulated unanimously for synergetic growth.</p>
  1356. <p>This will ensure the true essence of the indispensable phase of one’s life, EDUCATION. Its presence across all spheres, vast settings, and situations: the lifelong impact cannot be left entirely to a human creation. Such a gap is a sham. Methods like Search strategy and Inclusion and exclusion criteria work well under supervision. Academic integrity is the humorous satire that lies in humanity. It seeks intelligent—not artificial—justice.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/academic-integrity-in-the-age-of-ai/">Academic Integrity in the Age of AI</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1360. </item>
  1361. <item>
  1362. <title>October 18, November 4: World Changing?</title>
  1363. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/october-18-november-4-world-changing/</link>
  1365. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Ted Glick]]></dc:creator>
  1366. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 14:30:55 +0000</pubDate>
  1367. <category><![CDATA[Activism]]></category>
  1368. <category><![CDATA[Democracy]]></category>
  1369. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  1370. <category><![CDATA[Elections]]></category>
  1371. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
  1372. <category><![CDATA[Republicans]]></category>
  1373. <category><![CDATA[United States]]></category>
  1374. <category><![CDATA[Abigail Spanberger]]></category>
  1375. <category><![CDATA[Mikie Sherrill]]></category>
  1376. <category><![CDATA[Zohran Mamdani]]></category>
  1377. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162304</guid>
  1378.  
  1379. <description><![CDATA[<p>Many millions on the streets this Saturday all over the country loudly proclaiming: No Kings! Yes to Democracy!&#8211;followed on November 4th by victories for Mamdani in NYC, Sherrill in NJ, Spanberger in Virginia, redistricting in California, and more&#8211;could this be truly “world changing?” On one level, no. This is not a Presidential election year or [&#8230;]</p>
  1380. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/october-18-november-4-world-changing/">October 18, November 4: World Changing?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1381. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Many millions on the streets this Saturday all over the country loudly proclaiming: No Kings! Yes to Democracy!&#8211;followed on November 4th by victories for Mamdani in NYC, Sherrill in NJ, Spanberger in Virginia, redistricting in California, and more&#8211;could this be truly “world changing?”</p>
  1382. <p>On one level, no. This is not a Presidential election year or a Congressional election year. It’s an off-year electorally.</p>
  1383. <p>But it’s not an off-year politically. The battle is fully joined between the forces of democracy and the forces of authoritarianism, between the resistance and blind Trumpism. And because of this, what happens over the next three weeks could be a decisive turning point, victories for the significant majority of US Americans who are saddened and outraged by the lying, divisive, destructive and dangerous Trump federal government and its billionaire co-conspirators.</p>
  1384. <p>Think about it: potentially the biggest mass demonstration ever in the USA, in every single state and literally thousands of localities, organized by a broadly-based progressive/liberal/<wbr />independent coalition of hundreds of organizations that is not going away. That alone is a huge thing at this challenging time for the US and the world.</p>
  1385. <p>A Zohran Mamdani victory in itself will be a huge deal, a non-sectarian, democratic socialist becoming the Mayor of the country’s largest city, the financial capitol, a melting pot of diverse peoples and nationalities and which often leads the country as far as political shifts.</p>
  1386. <p>Mikie Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger winning the Governor races in their states will not be the same thing. Neither are consistently progressive, definitely not socialists, but there’s no question that many people to their left support them over the Trump-supporting Republican opponents. Combined with October 18 and a Mamdani victory and continued progressive organizing at the grassroots, that will make a difference in how they govern.</p>
  1387. <p>If California comes through and neutralizes Texas’ brazen, Trump-pushed, Congressional redistricting plan to try to gain 5 more Republican House seats from Texas next November, that will be important both practically and politically.</p>
  1388. <p>There’s something else, less visible and obvious but critical, that must be said about why we are at this point, why the popular resistance movement for democracy, justice and our threatened ecosystems is at this historic moment: we have learned how to unite.</p>
  1389. <p>It’s not unity based on following one great individual, usually a man. It’s not unity concerned very little with the internal culture, the health, of the organizations that make it up&#8211;just the opposite, in general. A critical mass of us of all ages, nationalities, genders and classes have internalized positive values and ways of working together which are making a huge difference in how we have responded, and will keep responding, to the efforts to impose a form of 21st century fascism in the USA.</p>
  1390. <p>The Trumpists are in trouble, and they know it. That’s why, one week before No Kings! Day, House leader Mike Johnson and others began publicly attacking it, lying about who we are and what we are about, trying to scare people away from coming out that day.</p>
  1391. <p>It’s not going to happen! There ain’t no power like the power of the people, united and organized, and when we are, nothing and no one can defeat us. Si, se puede!</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/october-18-november-4-world-changing/">October 18, November 4: World Changing?</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1395. </item>
  1396. <item>
  1397. <title>GQ Tips for the Modern Gentleman</title>
  1398. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/gq-tips-for-the-modern-gentleman/</link>
  1400. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Binoy Kampmark]]></dc:creator>
  1401. <pubDate>Wed, 15 Oct 2025 14:03:55 +0000</pubDate>
  1402. <category><![CDATA[Classism]]></category>
  1403. <category><![CDATA[Elitism]]></category>
  1404. <category><![CDATA[Carlos A. Scolari]]></category>
  1405. <category><![CDATA[flowers]]></category>
  1406. <category><![CDATA[gentleman]]></category>
  1407. <category><![CDATA[highwayman]]></category>
  1408. <category><![CDATA[manners]]></category>
  1409. <category><![CDATA[Narcissus]]></category>
  1410. <category><![CDATA[rules]]></category>
  1411. <category><![CDATA[Zygmunt Bauman]]></category>
  1412. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162319</guid>
  1413.  
  1414. <description><![CDATA[<p>It reads like a lament of wounded nostalgia, cresting on a resigned sigh. “Knowing how to be a gentleman used to be straightforward: There were codes that were passed down, instilled, and strictly enforced. With both social mores and the nature of masculinity itself wildly in flux, that’s not exactly the case anymore.” That’s the [&#8230;]</p>
  1415. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/gq-tips-for-the-modern-gentleman/"><i>GQ</i> Tips for the Modern Gentleman</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1416. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>It reads like a lament of wounded nostalgia, cresting on a resigned sigh. “Knowing how to be a gentleman used to be straightforward: There were codes that were passed down, instilled, and strictly enforced. With both social mores and the nature of masculinity itself wildly in flux, that’s not exactly the case anymore.” That’s <u><a class="western" href="https://www.gq.com/story/gq-125-rules-for-modern-gentlemen-manners-etiquette-guide">the claim laid</a></u> with trowels of suggestion by the editors of <i>GQ</i>.</p>
  1417. <p>They certainly stretch it. No fewer than 125 rules are suggested, some with greater sense than others. And they lack a contextual focus, misleading the reader about the origins of a title with a rich, mangled history entertaining, inconsistent and violent. For those fortunate enough to have a copy of <i>Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable</i>, this definition is offered about a gentleman: “Historically a man entitled to bear arms but not of the nobility; hence one of gentle birth, of some position in society, and with manners, bearing and behaviour appropriate to one in such a position.” </p>
  1418. <p>This is all good as a workable definition, till you identify other forms of gentlemanly behaviour that look distinctly antithetical to the popular understanding of the term. Take, for instance, the definition of a “gentleman of fortune”. This, according to Brewer, is a pirate, adventurer, or some such. A Francis Drake for Queen Elizabeth I. A gentleman of the road is an opportunistic, gun toting highwayman (to be such is to be a thief accustomed to mobility). A gentleman of the “four outs” was a “vulgar upstart, without manners, without wit, without money, and without credit.” If only the <i>GQ</i> puritans might have given us a taster of such precedents.</p>
  1419. <p>The <i>GQ</i> tick sheet has to account for the specific, unnerving changes that have taken place since humankind decided to lose the mind and treat the phone like a bank and dating centre. Rules are, in such a context, bound to be ephemeral, patchy, and disturbingly streaky. This, perhaps, is inevitable in a society operating in a state of, as the late sociologist Zygmunt Bauman <u><a class="western" href="https://giuseppecapograssi.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/bauman-liquid-modernity.pdf">called</a></u> it, “liquid modernity”. The solid order of modernism has transmuted into the liquid metaphor of constant, disruptive change. Relations alter with cutting frequency; states of mind adjust with the next technological push. Carlos A. Scolari goes further <u><a class="western" href="https://cscolari.medium.com/goodbye-liquid-society-welcome-gaseous-society-9ef0586d697d">with the proposition</a></u> that we now exist in a gaseous phase “where millions of crazed molecules collide and bounce off each other.” Silly as that may sound, these considerations can offer a sense of clawing back some sense of solidity in the form of custom – a most difficult challenge.</p>
  1420. <p class="western">Hence our problem with the modern gentleman. There is an assumption by the GQ list about what it is to be “a self-aware human”, a brave assumption in a society saturated with attention sapping clips on TikTok, snatches of attention in preparing for a classroom, and an almost proud acceptance that the news is not to be found in papers or media outlets but some screech of digital drivel from a closeted influencer. How does a gentleman cope with the cult of Narcissus, when even he might be found out looking at pictures, videos and shots of himself on a phone, rolling in a loop to sedate him into a state of unconscious irrelevance?</p>
  1421. <p class="western">These nightmarish conditions expounded, the first rule a gentleman as understood by <i>GQ</i> should behave like is to remove “your AirPods when you’re talking to someone. Muting doesn’t count.” This is sweet, as few can tell these days whether a person with AirPods or not makes the slightest difference to a conversation. An idiot can have, or lack.</p>
  1422. <p class="western">Certain suggestions are obviously confined to the prejudices of the <i>GQ</i> staff. Rule 4 notes that, while everyone loves receiving floral glories, best keep the number of stems to a minimum. “If not, you can’t go wrong with a few calla lilies.” The cart here should be upset with the suggestion that flowers, if you decide to pick them, be lasting in form. Australian natives are stunning in this regard: hardy, resilient and able to transform from moist beauties at their picking to sturdy, firm stems of everlasting defiance. Flowers are, as is the form, destined to wither, as do most relationships. The Australian bouquet suggests lengthy endurance. Just a thought.</p>
  1423. <p class="western">Some rules are left without explanation, presumably because the gentleman of <i>GQ</i>’s understanding fears being subject to litigation or detained by police at a moment’s notice for some unwise airing. Hence Rule 106 about not flirting with flight attendants, a revealing remark that says much about the staff of the publication and their frequent flier miles. </p>
  1424. <p class="western">Rule 101 admonishes those who fret about flight delays. (Those flights again.) This is a nice exit for those flight operators who have become casually incompetent in supplying services expected of them. “Stay composed,” <i>GQ</i> tells us with shamanic suggestiveness, which is a lovely way of saying to the gentleman that he must put up, shut up and remain stoic in not changing things. The corollary of that is to avoid the displays of lethal charm, combative language and general badinage that might, for instance, mock someone for not drinking or keeping up with the scoffers and carousers. Hence rule 74 (“have a chic nonalcoholic beverage option to toast with”) and rule 75 (“never ask why someone’s not drinking”). In these circles, surely the question “Why not?” would follow. </p>
  1425. <p class="western">There are the rules for the gentleman that hail from Boy Scout’s corner: offer up your seat for the pregnant or the elderly; open passenger doors for your date; be chivalrous in calling and paying for the Uber. (Clearly, public transport is to be abominated in this code in favour of a criminal digital based platform.)</p>
  1426. <p>There are some rules that seem beyond reproach. Introduce people to others, even if you have only just met them. “In general: Talk less.” That rule is acceptable and worthy, given that many a conversation seems fuelled and fluffed by vapid desperation and surfeit babble. Try (rule 88), to avoid talking about yourself. “It’s very boring at parties to have a person you are speaking to want to match your story with their own.” Not a bad rule, given the Code of Narcissus that smartphone followers abide by. </p>
  1427. <p>To turn up to a person’s abode for dinner, make sure, as rule 91 declares, that you leave anything there you brought in the first place. “I don’t care if the wine went unopened or the dessert sat untouched.” But how good it was that you brought the wine or dessert in the first place. </p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/gq-tips-for-the-modern-gentleman/"><i>GQ</i> Tips for the Modern Gentleman</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1431. </item>
  1432. <item>
  1433. <title>Epstein Files: Don&#8217;t Hold Your Breath</title>
  1434. <link>https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/epstein-files-dont-hold-your-breath/</link>
  1436. <dc:creator><![CDATA[Hope Loudon]]></dc:creator>
  1437. <pubDate>Tue, 14 Oct 2025 15:00:39 +0000</pubDate>
  1438. <category><![CDATA[Censorship]]></category>
  1439. <category><![CDATA[Corruption]]></category>
  1440. <category><![CDATA[Donald Trump]]></category>
  1441. <category><![CDATA[Journalism]]></category>
  1442. <category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
  1443. <category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
  1444. <category><![CDATA[Propaganda]]></category>
  1445. <category><![CDATA[Transparency/Secrecy]]></category>
  1446. <category><![CDATA[Gavin Newsom]]></category>
  1447. <category><![CDATA[Global Project Against Hate and Extremism]]></category>
  1448. <category><![CDATA[Jimmy Kimmel]]></category>
  1449. <category><![CDATA[Kilmar Abrego Garcia]]></category>
  1450. <category><![CDATA[Press Freedom Tracker]]></category>
  1451. <category><![CDATA[survivor testimony]]></category>
  1452. <category><![CDATA[Ted Starmer]]></category>
  1453. <guid isPermaLink="false">https://dissidentvoice.org/?p=162261</guid>
  1454.  
  1455. <description><![CDATA[<p>I have noticed supposed left organizations considering the Epstein files their secret weapon and naively pouring energy into advocating release. It is a doomed strategy. Is it insightful that Trump has not already released the Epstein Files? Of course it is, partially because it indicates the state is probably hiding something, but more so because [&#8230;]</p>
  1456. The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/epstein-files-dont-hold-your-breath/">Epstein Files: Don’t Hold Your Breath</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></description>
  1457. <content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><em>I have noticed supposed left organizations considering the Epstein files their secret weapon and naively pouring energy into advocating release. It is a doomed strategy.</em></p>
  1458. <p>Is it insightful that Trump has not already released the <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/most-americans-want-the-epstein-files-released-poll-finds" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/most-americans-want-the-epstein-files-released-poll-finds&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1J6iNpIFsdSAK9cQXOZxK6">Epstein Files</a>? Of course it is, partially because it indicates the state is probably hiding something, but more so because it means the state can get away with hiding things regardless of the obvious public interest. Does this mean the answer is to demand release of the files and focus on that as a way to discredit Trump? No, that will get you nowhere because the state is extremely experienced in hiding records even when they hand some to the public, and the Epstein files would not stop Trump even if they did prove he is a sexual predator (which everyone who lives in reality already knows). Believing the Epstein files are <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/09/democrats-trump-jeffrey-epstein/684115/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/09/democrats-trump-jeffrey-epstein/684115/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2gpFGx4S4TpihXeMuhI95v">Trump’s Achilles heel</a> or some silver bullet to stop him is a delusional fantasy and the mother of all distractions.</p>
  1459. <p>I filed probably well over a hundred public records requests to state entities between 2022 and 2024. The state routinely used a myriad of evasion strategies, some of which were impressively dirty, such that I can hardly remember any responses that appeared to be legally compliant. Moreover, there was nothing I could do about it unless I was willing to sue the state at personal expense as I <a href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/investigations/what-are-they-hiding-rural-school-district-withholds-employment-salary-information-2956702/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.reviewjournal.com/investigations/what-are-they-hiding-rural-school-district-withholds-employment-salary-information-2956702/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2tsh6-IYe8UCs6AQ1vK9Sq">explain here</a>, and that promised me no proportional benefits. Violating public records laws was the rule, not the exception, which was already undermining transparency, legal cases, and journalists’ jobs, helping ensure that the public was vastly under-informed about the widespread corruption that I believe is an essential prerequisite for fascism. Poynter, a journalism and media literacy nonprofit, <a href="https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2025/press-freedom-survey-investigative-journalism-barriers/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2025/press-freedom-survey-investigative-journalism-barriers/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2xE4oLmpiLEe6i8FTKpYTt">covers the problem</a> of the normalization of lack of transparency. <a href="https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/the-public-is-paying-the-price-for-local-government-secrecy/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/the-public-is-paying-the-price-for-local-government-secrecy/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3ItJSCUFIJ6humjn4QFyFn">The Press Freedom Tracker</a>, <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/delayed-denied-dismissed-failures-on-the-foia-front" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.propublica.org/article/delayed-denied-dismissed-failures-on-the-foia-front&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1cnWY1jG6zTGW1eCCe2Jko">Propublica</a>, <a href="https://niemanreports.org/journalist-public-records-lawsuits/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://niemanreports.org/journalist-public-records-lawsuits/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1hQlP784QnKrtiSrF6HADQ">Nieman Reports</a> and surely many others talk about <a href="https://archive.investigativereportingworkshop.org/news/journalists-put-the-public-in-public-records/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://archive.investigativereportingworkshop.org/news/journalists-put-the-public-in-public-records/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2KqyZiyTsZ1qimfZHnvJ7g">records suppression</a> too.</p>
  1460. <p>Journalistic outlets all over the country, unable to cover the actual scandals anymore, developed <a href="https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/governments-keep-you-in-the-dark-heres-what-the-rj-is-doing-about-it-2733714/?utm_campaign=widget&amp;utm_medium=latest&amp;utm_source=tag_what-are-they-hiding_page_3&amp;utm_term=Governments%20keep%20you%20in%20the%20dark.%20Here%E2%80%99s%20what%20the%20RJ%20is%20doing%20about%20it." target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/governments-keep-you-in-the-dark-heres-what-the-rj-is-doing-about-it-2733714/?utm_campaign%3Dwidget%26utm_medium%3Dlatest%26utm_source%3Dtag_what-are-they-hiding_page_3%26utm_term%3DGovernments%2520keep%2520you%2520in%2520the%2520dark.%2520Here%25E2%2580%2599s%2520what%2520the%2520RJ%2520is%2520doing%2520about%2520it.&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1T11bwUBc2ZU9YRMjeJ3ux">public records denial reporting</a> over the last several years. So, civil society and journalists, as in all authoritarian countries, carefully and indirectly imply a scandal by the lack of transparency rather than reporting the details of the scandal with the documents they could not obtain from the state. This is the kind of hard for the general public to interpret, desperate last vestige of public accountability you see in authoritarian regimes where journalists have to creatively report misconduct. It reflects the normalization of transparency law violations by the state and impunity for the state such that it cannot be compelled to follow the law and chooses not to regularly. Body cameras are a great example of a supposed accountability solution that <a href="https://www.propublica.org/series/black-boxes" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.propublica.org/series/black-boxes&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3_jMpVggQz2co4rtXlG6yu">never lived up</a> to promises and is now <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/drug-enforcement-administration-ends-body-camera-program-trump" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.propublica.org/article/drug-enforcement-administration-ends-body-camera-program-trump&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0xSzuxOed0_H0CsbSey9B6">not even pretending</a> to, meanwhile there are attempts brewing to <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/dhs-says-filming-posting-videos-of-ice-agents-is-doxxing-vows-prosecutions/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://truthout.org/articles/dhs-says-filming-posting-videos-of-ice-agents-is-doxxing-vows-prosecutions/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3-lk_pcijThD5pB9A8hmoN">criminalize videotaping</a> ICE.</p>
  1461. <p>In spite of the state’s long-standing record of transparency law violations and playbook for accomplishing them, organizations like <a href="https://indivisible.org/epsteinfiles" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://indivisible.org/epsteinfiles&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1ryFV07Bk2a3sqkh4R6W3u">Indivisible</a> waste their efforts and resources calling for release of the Epstein files. This is a gift to Trump because it will tell us nothing we do not already know, sway no one who is not already on our side, and keep everyone focused on a symbolic demand the state can easily undermine the value of while it consolidates power in far more dangerous ways. Do they really think the state is above fraud, fabrication, “losing” and disappearing evidence, and editing documents? Look at examples like Kilmar Abrego Garcia, as I explain <a href="https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/homeland-security-doxxing-abrego" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/homeland-security-doxxing-abrego&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3Pf_SmsXGw4AXQDeiCgm9E">here</a>, to see what the state can do when it comes to documents and evidence.</p>
  1462. <p>All people are doing by demanding the Epstein files is setting themselves up for disappointment, either in the form of getting nothing or getting a performative false release the state will spin as proof of its innocence and transparency. Look, here is <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/news/house-oversight-panel-releases-trove-of-epstein-files-handed-over-by-trump-administration/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nationalreview.com/news/house-oversight-panel-releases-trove-of-epstein-files-handed-over-by-trump-administration/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1gfZUCcrpQ1OLC8O5OzpVz">conservative propaganda</a> casting the release of Epstein files that are no doubt harmless to Trump as proof of transparency exactly as I anticipated. You know that quote, “Shoot for the moon, even if you miss, you’ll land amongst the stars”? Well, idiots shoot for the moon by demanding the Epstein files to somehow magically get Trump, and their “landing amongst the stars” is successfully <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/house-oversight-committee-subpoenas-epstein-files/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/house-oversight-committee-subpoenas-epstein-files/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3AM8L7B1RLPor8B4wwlooS">incriminating</a> other Epstein associates like the Clintons instead. Careful what you wish for. Any files released that included Trump would only amount to implying association not demonstrating guilt, which we do not need because everyone knows who Epstein’s friends were without the files. The <a href="https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/trump/2025/07/29/jeffrey-epstein-survivor-testified-she-met-donald-trump-at-age-14/85407198007/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.palmbeachpost.com/story/news/trump/2025/07/29/jeffrey-epstein-survivor-testified-she-met-donald-trump-at-age-14/85407198007/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1W7U-O0lbxL7ToB2JI_Z_5">survivor testimony</a> is far better than any guest list, and those survivors are <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-jeffrey-epstein-files-victim-pam-bondi-2108809" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-jeffrey-epstein-files-victim-pam-bondi-2108809&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0_Y8suiuM41QFkD74JGAck">saying</a> the files have been redacted to protect Trump. We know what we need to know, and there is <em>still</em> nothing we can do about it.</p>
  1463. <p>People who are still relying on U.S. democratic institutions (which are essentially destroyed, and now exist as a facade, a conclusion I came to two years ago and Ted Starmer echoes in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9NnQt_eQ0I" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v%3De9NnQt_eQ0I&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0facaWO8DRJLCbtx2KDFeD">this video</a> at minute 4:00), are using obsolete institutional or legal mechanisms and getting rewarded with meaningless breadcrumbs. Examples: Canceling Kimmel before reinstating him to make people feel like they <a href="https://wagingnonviolence.org/2025/09/jimmy-kimmel-movement-victory/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://wagingnonviolence.org/2025/09/jimmy-kimmel-movement-victory/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3YFBzGVkKbvmW8gTWadGeA">won</a>, the passport provision removed from H.R. 5300 when the state <a href="https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/the-state-doesnt-need-hr-5300-to" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/the-state-doesnt-need-hr-5300-to&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0hDb66CIdqXnNCdHSQD0e1">does not need it</a> to accomplish the same thing, stopping alligator Alcatraz only to have it <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/appeals-court-allows-alligator-alcatraz-continue-immigrant-detention/story?id=125271773" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://abcnews.go.com/US/appeals-court-allows-alligator-alcatraz-continue-immigrant-detention/story?id%3D125271773&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1dhwAHaBiv6TCxJcnq-Vdd">approved again</a> with even more <a href="https://www.wlrn.org/government-politics/2025-10-02/fema-awards-florida-608-million-for-alligator-alcatraz-reports-local-10-news" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.wlrn.org/government-politics/2025-10-02/fema-awards-florida-608-million-for-alligator-alcatraz-reports-local-10-news&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0nOB-vgsoNgPtMkgjLPrcR">funding</a>, etc. Corrupt actors manipulate the public on purpose, and I have seen it many times. They make people feel good by giving out <a href="https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/us-commemorative-quarters-an-omen" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/us-commemorative-quarters-an-omen&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw08qBRepAPWwJPfi6eZn2wu">cheap tokens</a> and image candy, while still doing the same dirty things in a more covert way, or they simply wait until public attention shifts to do something much, much worse.</p>
  1464. <p>Focusing naively on the Epstein files while the U.S. government transforms into a dictatorship is about as ridiculous as focusing gleefully on <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/newsom-can-t-stop-trolling-trump-s-escalator-meltdown/ar-AA1NoeHX" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/newsom-can-t-stop-trolling-trump-s-escalator-meltdown/ar-AA1NoeHX&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2m_qNPNgZJrW6udlVuMWvJ">Trump’s escalator trouble</a> while Trump <a href="https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/trump-seeks-to-destroy-the-un-and" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/trump-seeks-to-destroy-the-un-and&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3cx_gypN3WpMEBKZa7wg_U">prepares</a> to dismantle the United Nations. While the mainstream media is celebrating and exaggerating <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/americans-push-back-trump-are-winning-rcna230438" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/americans-push-back-trump-are-winning-rcna230438&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1PL_Wgmq7CTljBRinqo1v5">fake victories</a>, entertaining us with a distracting <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/internet-losing-over-latest-way-155028344.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/internet-losing-over-latest-way-155028344.html&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0t4Irc9qe4uPe2liSEdphp">p.r. campaign</a> wrestling match with Gavin Newsom, stoking wishful thinking about divisions and <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-musk-feud-timeline-twitter-truth-social-b2780187.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-musk-feud-timeline-twitter-truth-social-b2780187.html&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2AHxICe2MtNbj-CNrSV6AU">infighting</a>, and pumping out <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-far-weaker-looks-aoc-035756032.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-far-weaker-looks-aoc-035756032.html&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2hrPNtAJQS5opEpkQHe_8Z">propaganda</a> falsely casting Trump as being in a <a href="https://www.meidasplus.com/p/maga-is-scared-of-meidastouch-networkgood" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.meidasplus.com/p/maga-is-scared-of-meidastouch-networkgood&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3b9Qw0ZZknQHdqhkXizFHl">weak position</a> or <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/maga-is-panic1z6er1099092320399g-as-trump-finally-meets-his-match-opinion/ar-AA1La9g2" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/maga-is-panic1z6er1099092320399g-as-trump-finally-meets-his-match-opinion/ar-AA1La9g2&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1F3-Sueva45QQLydksWSEb">quaking in his boots</a>, Trump is <a href="https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/trumps-military-takeover-will-work" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thetaoofhope.substack.com/p/trumps-military-takeover-will-work&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2MkRbcl9SQhPKiNQyRI71L">taking over the military</a>. The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism maintains an excellent <a href="https://globalextremism.org/p25-updates/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://globalextremism.org/p25-updates/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw29rjqMDJuVIoweCtoGywb0">Project 2025 tracker</a>, and Project 2025 is being implemented even <a href="https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5435802-after-only-6-months-project-2025-is-halfway-complete/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/5435802-after-only-6-months-project-2025-is-halfway-complete/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw07r81DcaIWtqmZqFAqNhDB">faster than expected</a>.</p>
  1465. <p>The lack of Epstein file transparency did not stand in Trump’s way before, and there is nothing suggesting it will now. Everything Trump is getting away with should tell you that evidence of sexual crimes would do nothing to him. As he <a href="https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/donald-trump-fifth-avenue-comment/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/donald-trump-fifth-avenue-comment/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2urUivnBf8TMNj5VRtLO8e">said</a> in 2016, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.” Blatant acts of authoritarian oppression such as we now see daily, including <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/dhs-kristi-noem-calls-immigrants-dirt-bags-pledges-support/?fbclid=IwY2xjawIuZsdleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHeAv9NBvc3paJDkQc8DcJgiR69yvtD45cCW3-rSdFwX32gnwOaL47f7x-w_aem_6AKtMnkUhleicmM7X_fLhA" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.truthdig.com/articles/dhs-kristi-noem-calls-immigrants-dirt-bags-pledges-support/?fbclid%3DIwY2xjawIuZsdleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHeAv9NBvc3paJDkQc8DcJgiR69yvtD45cCW3-rSdFwX32gnwOaL47f7x-w_aem_6AKtMnkUhleicmM7X_fLhA&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0mQlQ2oyNFiV1hAqnfkXcS">official narratives</a> fully representative of that, are not evidence of fear but the total lack thereof. I will probably get accused of being a “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomer" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomer&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1760451465701000&amp;usg=AOvVaw10BX9RDBpQHgvRV0q-ntxq">doomer</a>” for denouncing the delusional belief in Epstein file kryptonite, but there is no silver bullet for American fascism and people need to stop looking for one. Believing in fake silver bullets only ensures real monsters advance unperturbed, and we are doomed if we are left defenseless when they arrive.</p>The post <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/10/epstein-files-dont-hold-your-breath/">Epstein Files: Don’t Hold Your Breath</a> first appeared on <a href="https://dissidentvoice.org">Dissident Voice</a>.]]></content:encoded>
  1469. </item>
  1470. </channel>
  1471. </rss>
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